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Iran's Quds Force "Advising Assad Regime"
(Telegraph-UK) Alex Spillius - The head of Iran's elite Quds force, Qassem Suleimani, is reportedly visiting Syria to advise the regime on repressing protests and the armed resistance. "It is his second visit at least," said Radwan Ziahdeh, an executive member of the opposition Syrian National Council. "The Quds force is working mainly with training, helping militias and snipers." The Quds, or Jerusalem, brigade is a special unit of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps responsible for external relations that reports directly to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Western and Arab experts and diplomats estimate the number of troops and advisers from the Quds force in Syria to be in the high hundreds or low thousands. They have set up at least one base in Zabadani near Damascus. Iranian help includes riot control equipment and technical advice on how to quash dissent and how to flood areas with security forces. The Free Syrian Army claims to have captured 29 Iranians. Reports in the Arab media have claimed that snipers from Iranian-backed Hizbullah forces have also been brought in from Lebanon to support government forces fighting the FSA.