Leaked document: Assad regime sent most Syrian jihadists to Iraq

(Zaman Al Wasl)- A document issued by the Syrian regime called the Syrian fighters heading to Iraq as jihadists confirmed those Syrians were travelling to Iraq to fight with knowledge of the security services which used to observe and follow their movement.

The document classified as very confidential and directed to chief office of military intelligence directly talks about a senior security meeting attended by heads of security departments 271 Idlib branch attended by 12 persons including 5 officers Ahmad Faris head of 271 branch, Nufal al-Hussein, head of terrorism and tracking down department, Jawdat Hasan head of military security branch.

The document notifies the chief of military intelligence division of what was proposed and discussed in the meeting held on February 10 2008 starting with the political situation and then military and security situation. The meeting addressed 26 articles discussing different issues.

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Most Syrians fought in Iraq were under Intelligence scope: documents

Under the security article, the issue of Syrians fighting in Iraq was discussed. The document mentioned in the 6 paragraph saying, “through following the jihadists who left the country to Iraq, 92 cases were observed during 2007 who did not refer to the security apparatuses and were not observed before. They were not discovered by any other security party in the province.”

The paragraph shows clear evidence of the Syrian fighters’ movement and influx to Iraq and that was under knowledge of Assad intelligence and perhaps sometimes under their direct sponsorship of some fighters. Also, the document shows evidence that regime was not concerned back then of that Jihad and was only interested in encircling and following up the Syrian fighters and not tracking them down or punishing them.

Most importantly, the document proves the duplicity of regime discourse. On the one hand, the regime claimed in front of United States and Iraq that it is against terrorism and against who participates in it and that it was working to limit influx of Syrian and Arabs to Iraq. On the other hand, the regime intelligence was describing what regime calls terrorists as jihadists and made sure they were observed and followed up. That means they were serving the agenda of Assad intelligence one way or the other with their knowledge or not; otherwise, the intelligence would have behaved differently with them as every Syrian knows in the basements of killing and torture and maybe under a very trivial accusation than Jihad and carrying weapons.

This document about the meeting of intelligence leaders in Idlib came to turn the hypothesis which says the regime intelligence knew and sponsored the fighter involved in Iraq into a fact proved by documents. It also can be added to two documents that Zaman al-Wasl published recently. One talks about Assad intelligence watching Harith al-Dari who was considered one of the symbols of resistance to the American invasion of Iraq.

The second document talks about following up the Syrian persons who left Syria to Iraq to fight the American forces and especially those affiliated with religious groups. It should be noted the document demanded limiting the names of the Syrian fighters in Iraq from following religious groups. It was issued from Palestine security branch 235 which is the most important Assad intelligence branch allocated to fight extremism and terrorism and focus a lot on Jihadist and Islamist movements.

It seems that Assad intelligence was and still is a master of the art of infiltrating and investing in Jihadist and jihadist movements, and it was not concerned about fighting terrorism and extremism unless they are directed to Assad regime, but otherwise, the regime observes and sponsors these movements.

All the documents related to fighters in Iraq and Assad stand regarding them remind of the content of a WikiLeaks document translated by Zaman al-Wasl. The document published on February 24 2010 talks about meeting between an American delegate with Syria minister of foreign affairs attended by Ali Mamlouk Director of General Intelligence back then.

In that telegraph, the American embassy in Damascus points out to what Mamlouk described as “30 years of Syrian experience in fighting extremist groups like Muslim brotherhood” bragging that regime intelligence is more successful than the American counterpart because, “we are practical and not theoretical,” according to him.

Mamlouk attributes the success of its intelligence in infiltrating terrorist groups clarifying, “in principle, we do not fight them or kill them directly, but we stick our agents inside the group and then we move in the convenient moment.”

Mamlouk describes inserting agents as complicated process pointing out that it led to arrest of tens of terrorists and prevented tens of terrorists of entering Iraq, adding that, we will go on with our work using all kinds of methods, but if we started cooperating with Washington, we will achieve better results and protect our interests in a better way.

Mamlouk reminds of the intelligence capacity and information wealth owned by the intelligence by infiltrating terrorist organizations to conclude saying, “we have a lot of experience, and we know these groups. This is our region and we know it. That’s why we should take the leadership.” Meaning leading any intelligence security cooperation between Damascus and Washington.

Mamlouk claimed during the meeting with Americans that foreign fighters who sneak to Iraq are coming from Arab and Islamic state and that Syria arrested many of them in addition to those to Syrians who facilitated the fighters’ entry into Iraq.

All the documents discussed are linked in a way with a secret leaked telegraph on August 25 2007 when American embassy in Damascus reported a detailed account of visit of Nuri al-Malki Prime Minister of Iraq to Damascus and meeting a number of officials in Damascus regime including Bashar al-Assad. The telegraph reports the Bashar said to Malki during their meeting that the main danger for Syrians and Iraqis is extremism and although extremist numbers increased, but they do not exceed thousands, “which make them under the control of our security apparatuses”.