LONDON: Daesh fighters began evacuating their final stronghold in southern Damascus on Sunday, a monitor said, bringing Syria’s government closer than ever to flushing out the last threat to the capital.
After weeks of combat and heavy casualties, an apparent deal was reached for remaining Daesh fighters to leave Yarmuk and the adjacent district of Tadamun, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Daesh militants burned their headquarters in Yarmuk before boarding buses with their relatives to leave the area, said Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman.
“The six buses left at dawn, heading east for the Syrian desert,” he added.
Abdel Rahman could not specify how many had left, but said a majority were relatives of militants and not armed. More than two dozen buses remained in Yarmuk for additional evacuations, he said.
Syrian state media and a Palestinian official have denied a deal was reached or that evacuations were taking place.
Yarmuk in particular has been devastated by Syria’s conflict, suffering a crippling government siege since 2012 and ruined by years of fighting.
It was once home to 160,000 Palestinian refugees, as well as Syrians, but just a few hundred remain.
Meanwhile, the State Department unit overseeing the fight against the Daesh will stay in business for at least six more months, reserving an administration plan for the unit’s imminent downgrade even as President Donald Trump presses ahead with a speedy US exit from Syria.
A plan initiated by Rex Tillerson before he was fired as secretary of state in March would have folded the office of the special envoy to the global coalition into the department’s counterterrorism bureau as early as spring, officials said. Tillerson’s successor, Mike Pompeo, canceled the plan this month, and the office will stay an independent entity until at least December, when there will be a new review, said the officials, who weren’t authorized to discuss the plan publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
The office reports directly to the secretary of state and the president, and the planned shift would have undercut its status and the priority of its mission. It could have led to staffing and budget cuts as well as the departure of the special envoy, Brett McGurk. He is now expected to remain in his job at least through the end of the year.
Still, the officials said Trump’s intent to reduce the US military and civilian stabilization presence in Syria has not changed and is, in fact, accelerating. The State Department has ended all funding for stabilization programs in Syria’s northwest. Daesh militants have been almost entirely eliminated from the region, which is controlled by a hodgepodge of other extremist groups and Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government forces.
At least some of the US money for those projects is expected to be redirected Syria’s northeast where Daesh fighters remain, the officials said.
The conflicting moves of retaining McGurk’s office while pulling out of the northwest illustrate how the administration is being pulled in different directions by Trump’s two competing interests: extricating the US from messy Mideast conflicts and delivering a permanent defeat to Daesh.
Trump has said the United States will be withdrawing from Syria “like very soon.” In late March, the State Department, the Pentagon and intelligence agencies tried to dissuade him from pulling troops out immediately, warning there was a risk Daesh would manage to regroup. Trump relented slightly, but told aides they could have only five months or six months to finish off Daesh and get out.
The US announced in September 2014 that it was forming a coalition of nations to defeat the nascent extremist group that had taken over vast swathes of Iraq and Syria. Days later, President Barack Obama named retired Marine Gen. John Allen the first special presidential envoy for the coalition. McGurk, his deputy, replaced him in 2015.
Almost four years later, Daesh no longer controls territory in Iraq, though US officials say its ideology remains a threat there. The final vestiges of the self-proclaimed caliphate are in Syria, where civil war has made it far trickier to wrest the militants from the few pockets of territory they still control.
Yet, as Trump’s administration eyes an exit as soon as Daesh is vanquished, the broader situation in Syria is not getting any better as far as American interests are concerned.
Assad’s forces are making inroads against the opposition and now control roads between Syria’s three main cities for the first time since the war broke out in 2011. Moscow is solidifying its influence, even hosting Assad for a surprise visit Thursday to Russia, where he met with President Vladimir Putin. And an outbreak of direct fighting between Israel and Iranian forces based in Syria has catalyzed concerns about Tehran’s involvement in Syria and the potential for a broader regional conflict.
“Hopefully, Syria will start to stabilize,” Trump said last week as he met with NATO’s secretary-general at the White House. “You see what’s been happening. It’s been a horror show.”
Nevertheless, there are no signs that Trump is backing away from his determination to limit US involvement to the narrow task of defeating Daesh, leaving to others the longer-term challenges of stabilizing the country, restoring basic services and resolving the civil war.
A $200-million pledge that Tillerson made in February for stabilization programs in Syria remains on hold on Trump’s orders and is under review. Tillerson, who had advocated for maintaining the US presence, was fired shortly after he made the pledge at a conference in Kuwait.
Then the administration this month decided to halt funding US military and reconstruction programs in the Syrian northwest, the officials said. Pending the results of the overall review, the canceled money is expected to be shifted to programs in northeast Syria, where US troops are still battling Daesh, and civilian teams from the State Department and US Agency for International Development are working in newly liberated areas.
US anti-Daesh office gets reprieve as Syria pullout accelerates
US anti-Daesh office gets reprieve as Syria pullout accelerates
- Daesh fighters begin evacuating their final stronghold in southern Damascus
- US State Department says anti-Daesh office in Syria will stay in business for at least six more months
Russia says Israel attacks on Iran are illegal, notes Iran’s commitement to NPT
- The statement said Moscow was waiting for the International Atomic Energy Agency to provide “unvarnished” assessments of the damage caused to Iranian nuclear facilities by Israeli attacks
MOSCOW: Russia’s Foreign Ministry on Tuesday denounced continued Israeli attacks on Iran as illegal and said a solution to the conflict over Tehran’s nuclear program could only be found through diplomacy.
A ministry statement posted on Telegram noted Iran’s “clear statements” on its commitment to adhere to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and its willingness to meet with US representatives.
The statement also said Moscow was waiting for the International Atomic Energy Agency to provide “unvarnished” assessments of the damage caused to Iranian nuclear facilities by Israeli attacks.
Qatari emir and Turkish president discuss Israeli attacks on Iran
- Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani and Recep Tayyip Erdogan emphasize important need to deescalate conflict and find diplomatic solutions
LONDON: Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, the Emir of Qatar, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday discussed Israel’s ongoing attacks on Iran, which began on Friday and have targeted nuclear sites, military leaders, intelligence chiefs and atomic scientists.
During their call, the leaders emphasized the important need to deescalate the conflict and find diplomatic solutions, the Qatar News Agency reported.
Earlier in the day, the Qatari minister of state for foreign affairs, Mohammed Al-Khulaifi, warned during a call with Rafael Grossi, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, that the targeting of Iranian nuclear facilities by Israel represented a serious threat to regional and international security.
The IAEA reported on Monday that an Israeli airstrike on Iran’s Natanz Nuclear Facility on Friday had damaged centrifuges at the underground uranium-enrichment plant, raising concerns about possible radiological and chemical contamination in the area.
Qatari minister of state, IAEA chief discuss ‘serious threat’ of Israeli strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites
- Mohammed bin Abdulaziz Al-Khulaifi reiterates Qatar’s condemnation of attacks on Iranian territory
- He said targeting nuclear facilities threatens regional, international security
LONDON: The Qatari Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Mohammed bin Abdulaziz Al-Khulaifi on Tuesday discussed the conflict between Israel and Iran with Rafael Grossi, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Al-Khulaifi discussed in a call the Israeli attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities that began on Friday, targeting the Natanz, Fordo, and Isfahan nuclear sites.
Al-Khulaifi stressed that targeting nuclear facilities was a serious threat to regional and international security. He reaffirmed Qatar’s commitment to dialogue to resolve conflicts and achieve peace in the region.
The officials discussed ways to improve the security of nuclear facilities and ensure they are safeguarded against threats, the Qatar News Agency reported.
Al-Khulaifi reiterated Qatar’s strong condemnation of the Israeli attacks on Iranian territory, deeming them blatant violations of Iran’s sovereignty and security, the QNA added.
The IAEA reported on Monday that the Israeli airstrike on Iran’s Natanz facility on Friday damaged the centrifuges of the underground uranium enrichment plant, raising concerns about potential radiological and chemical contamination in the area.
US pulls out of two more bases in Syria, worrying Kurdish forces
- The SDF did not respond to questions about the current number of troops and open US bases in northeastern Syria
AL-SHADADI BASE: US forces have pulled out of two more bases in northeastern Syria, visiting reporters found, accelerating a troop drawdown that the commander of US-backed Syrian Kurdish forces said was allowing a resurgence of Daesh.
The reporters who visited the two bases in the past week found them mostly deserted, both guarded by small contingents of the Syrian Democratic Forces — the Kurdish-led military group that Washington has backed in the fight against Daesh for a decade.
Cameras used on bases occupied by the US-led military coalition had been taken down, and razor wire on the outer perimeters had begun to sag.
A Kurdish politician who lives on one base said there were no longer US troops there. SDF guards at the second base said troops had left recently but refused to say when.
HIGHLIGHTS
• No US troops present at Al-Wazir and Tel Baydar bases.
• Daesh threat ‘has significantly increased’, SDF commander says.
The Pentagon refused to comment.
It is the first confirmation on the ground by reporters that the US has withdrawn from Al-Wazir and Tel Baydar bases in Hasaka province.
It brings to at least four the number of bases in Syria US troops have left since President Donald Trump took office.
Trump’s administration said this month it will scale down its military presence in Syria to one base from eight in parts of northeastern Syria that the SDF controls.
The New York Times reported in April that troops might be reduced from 2,000 to 500 in the drawdown.
The SDF did not respond to questions about the current number of troops and open US bases in northeastern Syria.
But SDF commander Mazloum Abdi, who spoke at another US base, Al-Shadadi, said the presence of a few hundred troops on one base would be “not enough” to contain the threat of Daesh.
“The threat of Daesh has significantly increased recently. But this is the US military’s plan. We’ve known about it for a long time ... and we’re working with them to make sure there are no gaps and we can maintain pressure on Daesh State,” he said.
Abdi spoke on Friday, hours after Israel launched its air war on Iran. He refused to comment on how the new Israel-Iran war would affect Syria, saying simply that he hoped it would not spill over there and that he felt safe on a US base.
Hours after the interview, three Iranian-made missiles targeted the Al-Shadadi base and were shot down by US defense systems, two SDF security sources said.
Daesh ruled vast swathes of Iraq and Syria from 2014 to 2017 during Syria’s civil war.
