Hazem Commander: 'we are not US agents'

Interview by Mohamed Al Faris; Translation by Dani Murad

(Zaman Al Wasl)- Captain Khaled Khaled, the military leader of “Hazem”, a movement made of several rebel groups, including a rump faction of the once-powerful Farouq Battalions, said in an interview with Zaman Alwasl, that the movement has been given so many promises to be supplied with anti-aircraft missiles, but under announced terms.

Khalid denied accusations to the movement of being an agent to the Americans, explaining the relationship with them as only to “receive Tao missiles”, under conditions that these missiles are documented in order not to fall into the "wrong hands".

Moreover, he also stressed that “Hazem” aims of any cooperation with regional or international powers to stop Assad’s attacks and deactivate its weapons, denying at the same time any American requests from “Hazem” to fight other Islamic groups in the country.

In regard to the emerging Islamic Emirates which are established every once in awhile, Khaled clarified that the movement refuses to talk about any emirate, because its current aims and efforts are focused on toppling the regime ,and once that’s achieved, it would be up to the Syrian people to decide the kind of government they want.

According to him, the missiles such as “Igla”, “Kopra” which are used by rebels have now become useless in comparison to Assad’s aircraft, since the regime is bombarding rebels-held areas from high places.

The captain also spoke about the negative role played by the revolutionary and international media in portraying the movement as “an American agent”, and again he denied any accusations of treachery, saying: “we deal with Americans to alleviate the suffering of our people, and not to fulfil America’s interests in our country”.

In terms of the recent conflict between the movement and “Ahrar Al Sham” in Bab al-Hawa Border Crossing, he said: “basically, we were the first to liberate the crossing, being part of “Farouq Al Shamal” and “Al Atareb Martyrs”. The crossing was liberated by the area’s residents and later greedy factions came and seized the place making it their headquarter, which we refused completely, and later, a member in “Ahrar Al Sham” provoked some of Hazem’s fighters, and we demanded the fighter’s transference, which did not happen and therefore clashes occurred, and the matter was taken to the Sharia court which ruled of our right to stay in the crossing”, he said.

“The movement called for the formation of a civil administration to the crossing, during a meeting with prominent factions including: “Hazem”, “The Islamic Front”, "Revolutionaries of Syria," and at that time, we refused to charge any money on people crossing the borders, but unfortunately some impeded and still hinder any initiatives to form a civil administration, putting their personal interests above everything else”, he added.

In addition to that, he also noted that there are 500 armed militants in the crossing who belong to different factions, and again demanded all these armed factions to leave the crossing and hand it over to a civil administration.

In regard to what is happening in the borderline after Al Nusra seized areas there, under the pretext of fighting corruptors, Khaled described the move as “Unexpected” because it’s unreasonable to empty the fronts in order to fight corruptors”, adding: “All factions should form a powerful force to expel bad people, and not leave the matter to one faction to decide”.

And he concluded by saying: “ Hazem movement has seven thousand fighters, who will only be part of a government determined and decided by the Syrian people, and these forces are going to be part of Syria’s new army .