Syria Live Coverage: Turkish Special Forces Enter the Country

Convoy of insurgents, flying the flag of the Islamist Jabhat al-Nusra on the move in Deir Ez Zor Province

See also Tunisia (and Beyond) Live Coverage: Death of Vendor Who Set Himself on Fire
Tuesday's Syria Live Coverage: The Bodies in Aleppo's "River of Martyrs"

---

1520 GMT: Fighting In Southwest Damascus. Reuters reports that despite rebel gains (described below) some of Assad's forces are well dug in, and have unleashed an intense rocket attack on Khan Alsheh:

An opposition campaigner in the nearby town of Jedeidet said troops stationed in hills overlooking Khan Sheih were attacking the area with multiple rocket launchers to try to dislodge rebels surrounding the barracks.

"I counted up to 20 explosions a minute on Khan Sheih," the activist, who uses the pseudonym of Abdo, told Reuters by phone.

A rebel commander in contact with the fighters said a force of some 1,000 insurgents had moved into Khan Sheih, which is 25 km from the Golan Heights, captured by Israel in 1967.

1508 GMT: Rebels Push Southwest of Damascus. A prominent microblogger finds a video of a recently captured base near the capital, the 1337th Regiment Air Defense Base (map):

#Syria #Damascus Field-trip with rebels in missile-base 137- captured some days agoyoutube.com/watch?v=ueTWxw… wikimapia.org/#lat=33.357022…

— Mark (@markito0171) March 13, 2013

As you can see from our updated map below (which is still very incomplete and general) the rebels are pushing to firmly establish a stronghold in Daraa, but at the same time they are also pressing north. While the map indicates that Darayya is surrounded by Assad forces and bases, this is somewhat of a misrepresentation because Assad's control over some of those areas is weakening. In fact, despite weeks of intense efforts to take Darayya, the rebels have beaten back most of these attacks and have expanded the amount of area in play southwest of Damascus.

If the rebels can close their area of control and fully unite their forces in Daraa with their forces in Darayya, the capital will be nearly surrounded by rebel forces:

View The State of the Syrian Conflict in a larger map

But the regime is not done fighting in Daraa yet. There are renewed reports of a renewed regime counterattack against Khan Alsheh (map) and Kherbat Ghazaleh (map). The regime may be shedding firepower right now, but it has a lot in this area to shed.

1450 GMT: Rebels Establish Law and Order in Lattakia. For two years many experts have called Lattakia a "regime stronghold." And yet, for that entire time EA Worldview has pointed out that large protests, clashes, and eventually a rebel offensive, have eroded Assad's strength in parts of Lattakia.

Al Jazeera English has a very interesting video from Lattakia province, where the rebels, not the regime, are trying to establish law and order:

1358 GMT: Battlefield Update. Tracking which towns or bases have fallen to the rebels, as opposed to which ones have been attacked or partially captured, is often hard to confirm. Especially away from a large population, the number of different citizen journalists is limited, often solely to the units doing the fighting. As such, news from the front lines is hard to confirm.

That said, it is clear that in the last 4 or 5 days, the rebels have made a push into central Daraa province, as well as the bases to the southwest of Damascus. Today there is heavy fighting in both areas. The regime appears to be trying to take back several bases and towns in the south. Battles here have been a tug of war back and forth for some time, but which each round the regime is losing ground.

In Al Raqqah and Deir Ez Zor the rebels appear to be expanding gains. Reports indicate that the Deir Ez Zor airport, a major base controlled by the regime, is in danger as rebels have taken a key base in the desert to the west. The base is critical to Assad's other bases in the city. Without it, they cannot resupply their forces, and their bases will be more vulnerable to the tacks and artillery that are in rebel hands.

If Deir Ez Zor falls to the rebels, the significance of that even should not be understated. An extremely well armed contingent of rebels, mostly Jabhat al Nusra and other Jihadist affiliates, is present in the city. These units have already proven that they can simultaneously attack Deir Ez Zor while expanding their efforts in al Raqqah and points north. If Deir Ez Zor falls, expect a cascading effect that may put this firepower in Aleppo in short order.

We'll be working to find out how the fighting on these fronts is going, and to confirm as many reports as possible.

1340 GMT: Jihadism Back from the Dead. New ideologies held by Jiahdists in Syria may be creating a new threat, one that is inadequately understood by the West.

In the first year of Arab Spring, jihadis appeal faded. Today, they're as strong as ever. Must read by @hhassan140 shar.es/e2TaC

— Jasmine Roman (@JasmineRoman01) March 13, 2013

Roman's statement it true. Exactly two years ago this week, Syrian protesters took to the streets en masse. But their pro-democracy and anti-secular message was even more noteworthy than their brave defiance. In fact, some of the largest protests in the spring of 2011 were unity protests, protests organized by a mix of opposition leaders, but rallies that were held in minority areas, pledging support for the non-Sunni population. Many analysts pointed out how Syria, and the Arab Uprisings generally, were destined to further isolate groups like Al Qaeda. In fact, during that period there were few victories and many defeats for Al Qaedism, and Jihadism in general.

But as the link in that tweet suggests, something has changed. The article is written by Hassan Hassan, who points out that a new form of Jihadism is on the rise in Syria. These new Jihadists often hide their extremism, and often build strong local connections. In essence, the Jihadists gain followers, and lose enemies, by winning "hearts and minds."

By failing to support people's just demands, the world is missing a chance to undermine extremism. Nowhere is this failure more pronounced than in Bilad Al Sham, which jihadis consider a "paradise" for fighting the near and far "enemies of Islam", including both Arab and western governments.

As countries have failed to provide services and protection to their people, jihadis on the ground have presented themselves as the alternative. In the first year of the Arab Spring, during the uprisings in Tunisia, Yemen and Egypt, the appeal of jihadis in the region faded into the background. Today, they are as strong as ever.

Hassan's article is both concise and incisive, and is my must-read for the day. Read it here.

James Miller takes over today's live coverage. Thanks to Scott Lucas for getting us started today.

1315 GMT: Death of European Union Staffer. A European Union staff member has been killed in a rocket attack near Damascus.

Ahmad Shihadeh, a policy officer with the EU delegation in Syria, was killed Tuesday in the Damascus suburb of Darayya, where he lived.

Shihadeh "died while providing humanitarian help to the community," said a spokesperson for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton. "Ahmad was known for his courage and selflessness."

1205 GMT: Turkish Intervention in Syria? Minister of Interior Muammer Güler on Wednesday has denied Turkish special forces went into Syria, with the co-operation of insurgent, to capture suspects in a bombing at a border crossing that killed 14 people last month.

“No Turkish security officers from the national police department carried out such an operation abroad. The people in question were detained at the [border] gate,” Güler told reporters in Ankara:

The suspects were detained at the border gate [Turkey] following close surveillance by police. Our police department and intelligence unit worked in great coordination with judicial units. Tens of thousands of photographs were examined and facial recognition technology and other techniques such as GSM tracking and legal wiretapping were carried out to get this result. I want to emphasize once again that there was no operation conducted within the borders of Syria.

0841 GMT: Children. The United Nations' children's agency, UNICEF, has put out a report, "Syria's Lost Children", documenting the effect of the conflict on the young.

UNICEF says of the 4 million in need of immediate humanitarian assistance inside Syria, 1.84 million are children and 536,000 are under 5 years old. Half of the more than one million refugees are children.

The report documents the damage to education, risks to health, hunger and stunting, and long-term mental trauma.

UNICEF reports that it has received only 20% of funds for an appeal of more than $195 million for operations to the end of June.

0619 GMT: Regime Conscription. State news agency SANA, citiing a "media source", says there is "absolutely no truth" in reports on Tuesday that President Assad will order general conscription of young men to fight for the regime.

The source that while military service is a "sacred national duty", claims were false that young men were being stopped at checkpoints and drafted into military service.

The reports of conscription followed a decree by Syria's Grand Mufti, Sheik Ahmad Badr al-Deen Hassoun, that the military forces need to increase the number of recruits and may resort to implementing compulsory service laws..

0615 GMT: Casualties. The Local Coordination Committees of Syria claim 103 people killed on Tuesday, including 50 in Damascus and its suburbs and 16 in Aleppo Province.

Unusually for the LCC, it specifically notes the death of insurgents, saying 10 members of the Free Syrian Army were slain near Damascus.

The Violations Documentation Center records 52,249 deaths since the start of the conflict in March 2011, an increase of 92 from Tuesday. Of the dead, 42.106 were civilians, an increase of only 29 from yesterday.

0605 GMT: Turkish Forces Inside Syria. Ankara confirmed for the first time on Tuesday that Turkish special forces have operated inside Syria.

Turkish official said the special forces were used to capture five suspects --- four Syrian and one Turkish --- accused of involvement in a February bombing at a border crossing that killed 14 people.

While there have been reports of foreign special forces operating in Syria --- for example, to help insurgents secure regime sites suspected of holding stocks for chemical weapons --- this is the first confirmation by a foreign government of intervention.

Moreover, the Turkish operation was arranged not only with the Free Syrian Army, which controls "liberated zones" near the Turkish border, but also the Al-Farouk Brigades and the Islamist Jabhat al-Nusra, which has been declared a terrorist organisation by the US.

The suspects were captured ina mountainous area, controlled by the Fatih Sultan Mehmet Brigade, of Lattakia Province in western Syria.