(Washington Institute for Near East Policy) Michael Knights - One of the most significant international brigades currently fighting on the Assad regime's side is Damascus-based Liwa Abu Fadl al-Abbas (LAFA), a collection of predominantly Iraqi Shiite fighters organized and supported by the Qods Force, an elite branch of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). LAFA appears to have soaked up a large proportion of the hardened, Iranian-supported militant cadres that harassed the U.S. military in Iraq. According to expert Phillip Smyth, the number of Iraqi Shiite militants in Syria fluctuates between 800 and 2,000, drawn from three Iraqi groups. The main contributor is Asaib Ahl al-Haqq (AAH), a group that splintered from Muqtada al-Sadr's movement in 2006 with support from the Qods Force. The second is Kataib Hezbollah (KH), an elite 400-man cadre of experienced Iraqi Shiite fighters reporting directly to the Qods Force leadership. The third is Kataib Sayyid al-Shuhada (KSS), a 200-man force led by Abu Mustafa al-Sheibani, an Iraqi Shiite who has worked under the Qods Force since the late 1980s.
2013-06-28 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive