Response to Ehsani2
By Roy Gutman – @Roy_Gutman

Dear Josh,

I have carefully read the letter “Ehsani2″ wrote and that you posted on Syria Comment. I would like to respond.

ISIS soldiers beheading five people charged with “spying for Syria’s New Army and the Crusade forces. [sic].” Their heads were displayed on metal pegs (Facebook/Syrian Observatory for Human Rights – June 2016)

By Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi

A flag of Usud al-Cherubim, using the cross in place of the initial ‘alif in the word Usud.

In a post in February 2016, a pro-Assad Christian page called Junud al-Massih (“Soldiers of Christ”) wrote: “Syria is beautiful in its Assad. At your service in soul and blood, my lord President Bashar al-Assad. We began with 5 groups on the ground and today we have become more than 15 armed Syrian Christian factions.” Though that post did not name any specific groups, perhaps the most recognisable Christian militia of pro-Assad orientation has been the Sootoro group in Qamishli in northeast Syria, a group I have discussed multiple times previously. However, there are much more obscure Christian formations that the Junud al-Massih page likely has in mind in its counting in that post, one of those groups being Usud al-Cherubim (“Lions of the Cherubim”). The word “cherubim” in the militia’s name can be seen as a double entendre. In the Bible, there are multiple references to the cherubim as beings associated with God (e.g. Ezekiel 10:2). Yet looking at the Arabic orthography for the word “cherubim” in the case of the militia’s name, there is in fact also an allusion to the Deir al-Cherubim (“The Cherubim Monastery,” with Arabic spelling: دير الشيروبيم) near Saydnaya, which is best known as the site of the prison that housed many Islamists who were released in an amnesty in 2011 and went on to found key rebel groups like Ahrar al-Sham and Jaysh al-Islam. A fighter in Usud al-Cherubim confirmed to me that the group’s name derives from Deir al-Cherubim.

According to this fighter, Usud al-Cherubim was formed in 2013 during “the terrorist attack on the monastery” and the group lost a fighter called Joseph al-Kibba “in the battles of the monastery in defence of the monastery.” For context, Joseph al-Kibba is a widely renowned Christian ‘martyr’ of the Saydnaya area who was born in 1989 and killed on 26 November 2013. His funeral was promoted in a video uploaded by the official channel of the National Defence Forces, which were reported to have played a role at the time alongside the Syrian army in fending off the attacks on Deir al-Cherubim. For their part, pro-rebel media during this period accused the regime of deliberately placing tanks near the monastery to bombard neighbouring areas, thereby attempting to score a propaganda victory against the rebels in their response to the bombardment.

Public references to Usud al-Cherubim appear to go back as far as January 2014. Though the militia can be seen as initially having been set up as a local ‘monastery defence’ force, the group has subsequently participated in a number of military engagements beyond the Saydnaya area. According to the Usud al-Cherubim fighter, engagements have included “all the battles of East Ghouta, Darayya, Homs countryside, the battles of al-Qalamoun, and in Jobar in Damascus.” In addition, Usud al-Cherubim has a “contingent in the north Hama countryside participating in the battles of honour.” Some of these expeditions have been promoted on social media. For example, in September 2015, Usud al-Cherubim reportedly helped capture the hills surrounding the Christian locality of Maarouneh in the Damascus countryside, driving back the rebels to the Harasta highway and handing the hills to the Syrian army. In November 2015, the group was reported to be operating in areas of the Homs desert near al-Qaryatayn such as Mahin and Sadad, fighting against the Islamic State (IS). A number of other groups participated in the efforts to push back IS in the area, including the Syrian Social Nationalist Party’s Nusur al-Zawba’a and Sootoro. Below is some photo and other media output associated with Usud al-Cherubim’s operations.

“Merry Christmas from Usud al-Cherubim in Jobar”- 2014.

The Zilzal Jobar (“Earthquake of Jobar”) contingent of Usud al-Cherubim. Its leader- Jihad Hilala- was reported in late February 2016 to have been wounded.

“Operations Battalion- Usud al-Cherubim- at your service Syria, at your service, ya Adra.” Though Adra is the name of a town in the wider Damascus area, the invocation ‘Ya Adra’ normally refers to the Virgin Mary. Note the logo design featuring the cross in the top-left.

“North Hama countryside- Operations Contingent- Usud al-Cherubim.”

“Operations Battalion- Usud al-Cherubim in Darayya.” The participation in the Darayya operations was partly framed as “liberating its churches” (in a similar way, Shi’i militia participation in the Darayya operations was portrayed as defending/liberating the Sayyida Sakina shrine in the area). The idea of holy struggle is also conveyed in the frequent self-description as “mujahideen of the cross.”

Usud al-Cherubim graffiti in Shebaa, East Ghouta. The graffiti, marked with the date 4 May 2016, reads: “Usud al-Cherubim: we are the descendants of Georgius [St. George]. We were not created to die, but rather we were created for eternal life.”

In total, the fighter from Usud al-Cherubim told me that the group has 3 ‘martyrs’ and 12 wounded thus far. One therefore ought to keep the scale of the group’s military contributions in perspective. As for the militia’s affiliation, the source stated that Usud al-Cherubim is affiliated with the air intelligence, with which a number of  pro-regime militias have links/affiliation, including the elite Tiger Forces and the Suqaylabiyah-based Christian militia Quwat al-Ghadab. Indeed, a key to realizing the affiliation of Usud al-Cherubim with the air intelligence is that the group is referred to on social media as being part of Hurras al-Fajr (“Guardians of the Dawn”), which is a collection of primarily Christian militias affiliated with air intelligence.

“Air Intelligence Administration: Guardians of the Dawn Groups. A homeland that we do not protect is one we do not deserve to live in.” Like many pro-regime militias, Guardians of the Dawn has sought to recruit through Facebook, urging those wishing to join the ranks to correspond for inquiry and further information.

Guardians of the Dawn insignia

According to the fighter from Usud al-Cherubim, the Guardians of the Dawn conglomeration was set up around a year ago, and Usud al-Cherubim joined it. In other words, Usud al-Cherubim may have initially been its own independent faction having sprung up from the notion of local monastery defence, but eventually became air intelligence affiliated. As the source put it, “We had been working with many sides. Later we remained as air intelligence.” The Guardians of the Dawn conglomeration, though consisting of primarily Christian militias, promotes a nationalist image in the slogan “a homeland we do not protect is one we do not deserve to live in,” as can be observed above. Besides Usud al-Cherubim, the constituent groups of Guardians of the Dawn have included:

– Ararat Group
– Usud al-Wadi (referring to Wadi al-Nasara in Homs province)
– Usud al-Hamidiya (referring to the Hamidiya neighbourhood of Homs)
– Intervention Regiment
– Usud Dwel’a (referring to the Dwel’a neighbourhood of Damascus)

Of these groups, one should note that Usud al-Hamidiya-led by Rami Marina from Homs– appears to have left Guardians of the Dawn, and is now affiliated with the military intelligence under the formation of Fawj Maghawir al-Ba’ath (“Ba’ath Commandos Regiment”) led by Jihad Barakat.

According to an account by Guardians of the Dawn leader Fadi Abd al-Massih Khouri written in September 2016, the Guardians of the Dawn conglomeration was formally established on 11 September 2015, and Usud al-Cherubim had a key involvement in events that led to its establishment. According to this account, Usud al-Cherubim issued a distress call to Khouri on Thursday night on 10 September 2015, warning that the locality of Maarouneh was under assault by Jaysh al-Islam, that the situation was difficult and that these rebels were threatening to seize the international highway. This prompted Khouri to make connections with the other groups (i.e. the constituents of what became the Guardians of the Dawn conglomeration) and set up the Intervention Regiment in particular. By 12 September 2015, Khouri claims to have set out with a contingent of fighters to provide relief. All this, he writes, is based on the idea that the groups should work to help each other out in times of distress as their villages come under assault.

Although there is a nationalist line of rhetoric included in the account, with the affirmation that “all the land of Syria is our people and everyday someone seeks our help and of course we will heed the call,” all the actual instances of relief provision named are Christian areas, “from Maarouneh to Sadad to Mahrada.” Mahrada is a Christian town in Hama province that was threatened by some rebel advances earlier this year, prompting a mobilization including Guardians of the Dawn to defend it.

Like many people involved with the militias on the ground, Khouri attempted to push for political influence by running as a parliamentary candidate for the April 2016 elections. However, unlike Liwa al-Baqir’s Omar al-Hassan, he was unsuccessful.

Social media graphic: “Ararat Group: Dir’ al-Watan Groups.” Dir’ al-Watan (“Homeland Shield”) appears to have been the initial name for Khouri’s conglomeration of militias, though having the same air intelligence affiliation. In relation to the Sadad operations in November 2015, Sootoro wrote: “Dir’ al-Watan. Entering Sadad. Big thanks from all the groups to Ustadh Fadi Khouri for his support and great work.” Thus, this Dir’ al-Watan should not be confused with the Dir’ al-Watan of the al-Bustan Association, or the Dir’ al-Watan in Suwayda’. As an actively used and promoted brand on social media for Khouri’s conglomeration of militias, Guardians of the Dawn does not seem to appear initially until March 2016.

Ararat Group, using a slight variant on the Guardians of the Dawn slogan: “A homeland you do not protect is one you do not deserve to live in.”

In short, the case of Usud al-Cherubim provides an interesting case of evolution from a local initiative to an affiliate of a wider militia conglomeration attached to the air intelligence. The existence of Usud al-Cherubim also illustrates that notions of defence of holy sites as rallying calls are by no means limited to the Shi’a alone. Indeed, as the case of the Syriac Military Council demonstrates, the idea of defending churches and other holy sites from desecration and destruction has been an important talking point among Christians in the east of the country as well.

Of course, Usud al-Cherubim goes beyond mere defence of the Deir al-Cherubim monastery, and has been actively fighting for the regime elsewhere in western Syria. The developments surrounding Guardians of the Dawn also point to wider trends among pro-Assad militias: namely, a desire to assert political influence (while not threatening Assad’s position as president of Syria) and competition for power on the ground (which, in the case of the various intelligence agencies in particular, also represents continuity with the past).

DAM WARS: How Water Scarcity Helped Create ISIS
by Quentin de Pimodan
December 12, 2016

Quentin de Pimodan sent me this interesting paper on ISIS and water wars. He writes:

I have finally completed my paper that proves that ISIS emerged thanks to the catastrophic water management and policies implemented in Iraq since Saddam ruled. It has been published by the Greece-based Think Tank, The Research Institute for European and American Studies.

I explain that the Agricultural economy in Iraq collapsed a long time ago. Then the harsh natural environment of Iraq is connected to the regional battle over water resources, the failure of the water policies, the huge mistakes made in writing the 2005 Iraqi Constitution, how this precipitated the rise of ISIS and their strategy to control dams, and the failure of the counter-insurgency efforts. Then I highlight priorities and end with some predictions.

IRAQ-SECURITY/MOSUL-DAM (Youssef Boudlal/Reuters)

The paper is long, but I think that I have managed to prove my point. I have used approximately 200 sources including international organizations’ data, NGOs, or journalists’ articles.

Quentin de Pimodan studied engineering in Paris and then for several years worked for a French publishing house that focuses on explaining national and international administrations to young audiences. He spent a year in Yemen in 2008 and based in Bahrain for two years in Bahrain in 2014 he co-authored “The Khaleej Voice”, a six books series documenting the urban artists in the GCC. He currently works as an analyst for Katch & Reyners, a public affairs company based in Paris and contributes to Greece-based thin-tank, the Research Institute for European and American Studies (RIEAS).
http://qdepim.pressfolios.com
FRA: +33.622276001

By Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi

An emblem of Saraya al-Areen.

The coastal province of Latakia is home to a variety of militias aligned with the Assad regime. One kind that can perhaps be distinguished consists of groups that seem to be independent in affiliation but are clearly associated with the Alawite community and identity. A previous case I have examined is that of Liwa Usud al-Hussein (“The Lions of Hussein Brigade”), reconstituted as Quwat Humat Souriya (“Forces of the Protectors of Syria”) and led by one Hussein Tawfiq al-Assad, who comes from the Assad family’s ancestral village of al-Qardaha. In the summer, the militia launched a recruitment campaign, urging those interested in joining to head to the group’s base near the al-Qardaha bridge, with an offer of a salary of 80,000 Syrian pounds a month for fighting on the Palmyra front and 50,000 Syrian pounds a month for fighting on the Latakia countryside front. Like many other militias, Quwat Humat Souriya sought to address the issue of draft avoidance and desertion by offering taswiyat al-wada’ (“sorting out of affairs”).

Saraya al-Areen (“Brigades of the Den”)- the group under consideration in this article- is a militia similar in nature to Liwa Usud al-Hussein. The “Areen” (“Den”) part of the group’s name can be taken in a number of ways: as in, the lion’s den- Areen al-Assad- that has the double entendre of referring to the lions in the militia emblem above and to Assad himself. There is also the use of the word areen in the Syrian national anthem, which describes Syria as the Areen al-Uruba (“Den of Arabism”).

Of note alongside the lion imagery in the emblem above is the feature of the number 313. This number also appears in other symbols associated with the group, including those that feature its alternative name of Fawj Abu al-Harith (“The Abu al-Harith Regiment”), named for the militia’s leader who goes by the name of Abu al-Harith.

Fawj Abu al-Harith: 313.

Another Fawj Abu al-Harith emblem, incorporating the lion symbol.

Insignia patch for Fawj Abu al-Harith. Again the 313 appears.

Saraya al-Areen insignia patch featuring the number 313, as well as the Dhu al-Fiqar of Imam Ali.

The number 313 has multiple connotations. In the life of the Prophet Muhammad, it refers to the number of Muslim soldiers at the Battle of Badr in a significant victory over the Quraish. In this regard, it should be noted for example that there is a rebel group called “Soldiers of Badr: 313” operating in the north Homs countryside rebel enclave. The number 313 also has eschatological significance, in referring to the companions of the Imam al-Mahdi. It is therefore associated in the eschatological context foremost with Twelver Shi’i Islam, of which the Alawite religion is an offshoot. Unsurprisingly, the number 313 has been observed in Shi’a militia discourse and social media on Syria.

Perhaps part of the Saraya al-Areen’s image can be seen as influenced by the presence of Shi’i militias, since the group’s social media output has also featured slogans like Labbayk ya Zainab (“At your service, oh Zainab”), foremost associated with the Iranian-backed Shi’i militias fighting in Syria under the notion of defending the Sayyida Zainab shrine in Damascus. I have touched on the wider use of Shi’i sloganeering previously. Even so, the Saraya al-Areen identity is clear through its promotion of photos of Alawite shrines in the al-Qardaha area.

Like Liwa Usud al-Hussein, Saraya al-Areen is said to be an independent faction, going by the testimony of a source in the Muqawama Souriya of Ali Kayali (whose primary base is also in Latakia province, though curiously Kayali tells me he has not heard of the name of Saraya al-Areen). The leader of Saraya al-Areen- Abu al-Harith (not to be confused with the Abu al-Harith who leads the Hawarith contingents of Suhail al-Hassan’s Tiger Forces)- is a man called Yisar al-Assad. He comes from the wider Assad family of the al-Qardaha area in Latakia province. While social media advertising for the brands of Saraya al-Areen/Fawj Abu al-Harith only seems to have come about this year, Yisar al-Assad had previously been identified as leading an armed contingent. A revealing post written in April 2015 by a Syrian army soldier from Latakia complaining about the privileges and lives of luxury of government officials’ children as opposed to the hardships of those serving in the army makes reference to Yisar al-Assad, upholding him and other members of the wider al-Assad family as virtuous in contrast to these officials and their children:

“Bitter truth and hurtful frankness…Oh son of the official, what do you feel when you ride in your car and you have a soldier serving you? Oh son of the official, what do you feel when you see the news that the army has advanced in a certain place and has liberated a certain area? Oh dear, is it possible for you to tell me what you feel when you hear that this poor soldier has been martyred to defend you and protect you? Oh son of the official, what do you feel when you know that the salary of the reservist soldier is only 15,000 Syrian pounds a month and under your stead is great wealth? Oh son of the official, is it possible for you to tell me what you feel when the soldier has for breakfast 5 olives, a piece of halawa or potato while you have the most magnificent food for breakfast (God make you eat samm al-hari!)? Oh you, official, and your son: what do you feel when the soldier has to wait for months to see his family and wait for months to have a bath? Soldiers lie down on the soil, wrapped in the Pleiades, while people lie down on ostrich feathers, wrapped in silk covering.

Fine, let’s begin now with this talk, and I will begin with the al-Assad family so no one is startled at us on your behalf and speaks: from the al-Assad family, Hilal al-Assad was martyred in Kessab- may God have mercy on him- and his group is from the poor of the coastal region. The Sheikh of the Mountain Muhammad al-Assad- may God have mercy on him- was daily in the Durin region in the Latakia countryside and I saw him with my own eye in complete civilian clothing, and when the leadership asked him to form the mountain brigade, he was exposed to assassination. Yisar al-Assad Abu al-Harith has the strongest fighting group in the mountain, and their salaries and expenditures are on his personal shoulder. May God protect him and his group of poor people from the region. As for what remains from the wealthy and the officials, their children are living with the comfort and eye of God upon them, but God’s curse be upon their effeminate manliness! The poor of Syria are the ones who have borne the burden of the cause. The poor of Syria are the ones who have offered martyrs. The poor of Syria are the ones who have sacrificed what is most precious and dear in self-sacrifice for the homeland.”

While one may wish to dismiss this post as a rant, it makes some important points. Syrian army service is indeed long, has poor working conditions and very low salaries. The bad terms of service are a key factor behind militia recruitment, as militia groups can offer better salaries and amnesty terms to prevent arrest for draft evasion. It is also true that the Sahel [coastal] region has many poor people, including among the rural Alawites. That Alawites are over-represented in the regime and its security apparatus leadership in particular does not mean Alawites are somehow immensely wealthy compared to the rest of the population. On the contrary, many parts of rural Latakia are underdeveloped. As for using the wider al-Assad family as a foil against wealthy government officials and their scions, one can make what one will of this line. In any case, the reference to Yisar al-Assad as providing the salaries and expenses for the fighters of his group corroborates the view of Saraya al-Areen/Fawj Abu al-Harith as an independent faction, in that it appears to be Yisar al-Assad’s own initiative rather than having a larger affiliation.

Other references to Yisar al-Assad are rather scarce. He played a role in 2014 in overseeing celebrations in the al-Qardaha area congratulating Bashar al-Assad on his predictable re-election as president. A reference to him also turns up at the very start of the civil war in March 2011, in which he is described as being one of the shabiha of al-Qardaha. In so far as the term shabiha is used in keeping with its historical origins to refer to Alawite smugglers in the coastal region who have made large profits and acted as though they were above the law, then it might appropriately apply to Yisar al-Assad. The pro-opposition newspaper Zaman al-Wasl, claiming to have criminal and intelligence records on people from the wider al-Assad family, identifies a Yisar al-Assad as born in 1977 in al-Qardaha and involved in smuggling and possession of war weapons.

Saraya al-Areen poster, featuring an image of Bashar al-Assad.

When did Saraya al-Areen/Fawj Abu al-Harith come into existence? As mentioned, social media promotion only seems to have come about this year, but that does not mean Yisar al-Assad’s group did not exist in some form prior to 2016. Besides the April 2015 post cited above that identifies him as leading a fighting contingent, a representative for Saraya al-Areen told me that “we have been fighting since the beginning of the crisis, affiliated with the Syrian Arab Army. We fight terrorism in any place.” These remarks can be seen as little more than standard rhetoric, in that it can be a matter of prestige to say your group has been fighting from the outset of the civil war, but there can also be an element of truth in that militias that only recently started promoting themselves on social media can still have existed on the ground under prior names and forms (cf. Liwa al-Baqir and the Local Defence Forces in Aleppo).

In terms of military engagements promoted under the Saraya al-Areen/Fawj Abu al-Harith brands, they primarily concern the Latakia front, as regime forces aim to push the rebels out of the last strongholds in the northeastern corner of the province, contrasting with the threat posed in 2013 when a rebel offensive spearheaded by jihadists came very near to al-Qardaha. The operations in Latakia have included coordination with the Dir’ al-Amn al-Askari (“Military Security Shield”) forces that are affiliated with the military intelligence in Latakia province. The militia also promoted deployments earlier in the year on the Aleppo front. Alongside these operations, the militia has claimed a number of ‘martyrs’, some of which are noted below.

Ali Jamil Zahra. Death announced on 3 June 2016. Killed on Kabani front in Latakia countryside. Note his Fawj Abu al-Harith 313 armpatch.

Abd al-Badi’ Nu’aim al-Hashim. Death announced on 12 June 2016. Killed on Latakia countryside front.

Mu’tazz Hassan Fidhdha. Death announced on 15 June 2016. Killed in Khanaser, south Aleppo.

Ahmad Muti’ Armit. Death announced on 15 June 2016. Killed in Khanaser, south Aleppo.

Mahmoud Samir Shahira. Death announced on 20 July 2016. Killed on Kabani periphery, Latakia countryside.

Sam Ali al-Qayyim. Death announced on 5 October 2016. Killed in Tallat Hassan al-Ra’i, Latakia countryside. He was a field commander in the militia: specifically, the leader of the “the first assault group.”

Muhammad Jum’a Jabiro. Death announced on 7 December 2016. Killed on Kabani front, Latakia countryside.

Talal Abdullah Mustafa. Death announced on 10 December 2016. Killed on Kabani front, Latakia countryside.

In short, the existence of Saraya al-Areen/Fawj Abu al-Harith, like Liwa Usud al-Hussein, provides an interesting case study for the militias of distinctly Alawite identity with roots in the wider al-Assad family of the al-Qardaha area, seemingly lacking the familiar affiliations to larger bodies like elite army units or one of the intelligence branches. This case illustrates one of many aspects of the complex militia landscape in regime-held Syria.

HRW witnesses KDP asa’ish preventing a Yazidi civilian family from bringing rice and pillows for their own use into Sinjar. Photo: 2016 Belkis Wille/Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch has issued an important new report on how the Kurdish Regional Government’s implementation of an economic blockade of the Iraqi Sinjar region is preventing Yazidi families (displaced during ISIL’s genocide of Yazidis in 2014) from returning and rebuilding their homes and lives. This situation has persisted for most of the past year, though it has not been significantly reported upon by media.

READ the FULL REPORT HERE.

HRW personnel witness KDP asa’ish preventing a Yazidi man from transporting a sheep for a funeral. Photo: 2016 Belkis Wille/Human Rights Watch

Is Assad the Author of ISIS?  Did Iran Blow Up Assef Shawkat?
By Ehsani2
5 December 2016
For Syria Comment

Roy Gutman, Journalist The Daily Beast

In a three-part series, Pulitzer Prize winning reporter Roy Gutman relies on a number of Syrian opposition members to make the central claim that “the Syrian regime’s collusion with the terrorists of the so-called Islamic State goes back a decade.” This is not the first time that Assad has been accused of complicity in the horrors of ISIS. But the claims have renewed urgency because the Syrian opposition is worried that Donald Trump’s anti ISIS strategy will come at the expense of U.S. support for the Syrian opposition. They worry that Washington will “shift policy in the Syria conflict from one of support for the moderate opposition to collaboration with the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.”

Credibility of the Sources:

The article is based on testimonies from what Mr. Gutman refers to as political activists, defectors, Islamists from Hama province, former State officials and diplomats (asking for political asylum in the U.S), and former head of the Syrian Opposition coalition.

Bassam Barabandi, a former employee of the now closed Syrian Embassy in Washington, DC.

One key source whose name seems to appear often throughout the article is Bassam Barabandi. Mr. Barabandi is a 41 year-old ex-diplomat who worked at the Syrian Embassy in Washington. He defected to the opposition after he used his position as a consular officer to issue Syrian passports to a number of opposition figures whose travel documents had expired. Back in 2014, he wrote an article for the Atlanic Council, entitiled “Inside Assad’s Playbook: Time and Terror with Tyler Jess Thompson who is a director at United for a Free Syria.  This was an early attempt to link President Assad to Islamist terror groups. Had Mr. Gutman known anything about Syria, he would have been more suspicious of Mr. Barabandi based on a preposterous single claim he makes in the article. Supposedly, during a visit from Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki, Mr. Barabandi remembers being huddled with Deputy Vice President Mohammad Nasif and “taking notes, monitoring interactions, disrupting conversations and altering room dynamics.”  Mr. Barabandi quickly concludes that “no detail is too small for the Assad regime to overlook. There is always a plan, opportunities are never missed, and there are no accidents: the rise of ISIS is no exception to this rule.” Barabandi’s story about sitting in the Four Season’s Hotel with Syria’s Deputy Vice President is unbelievable for several reasons. The most obvious is that Nassif, an elderly man and top security chieftain would not be hanging out with Barabandi, a young 30 something civil servant who had yet to take up a post of any consequence. Moreover, Nassif would certainly not explain to him the inner-most secrets of the regime, nor demonstrate to him how the secret service operates behind one-way mirrors to manipulate foreign dignitaries. This account is absurd.

When reading this article, one is reminded of Frontline’s Martin Smith when he confronted Ahmad Chalabi in Baghdad following the U.S invasion. Smith challenged Chalabi to provide the evidence of that he had promised existed to prove the existence of chemical weapons, a nuclear program, and Saddam’s links to Al-Qaida. Chalabi simply looked at Martin Smith with consummate distain and dismissed his badgering questions. Chalabi simply stated, “We are in Baghdad now.” For Chalabi, any fabrication was worth the result. Saddam was destroyed and America had returned Iraq’s opposition to Baghdad.  Chalabi stood at the gates of power. As he explained to Matin Smith, had the United States not decided to destroy Saddam’s regime, Saddam would have remained in power and his children would have come to power after him. Chalabi expressed no contrition about his lies, because they had been successful. He had played the Americans and convinced them to do the heavy lifting for the Iraqi opposition that was fragmented and weak.

The Syrian opposition sources that Mr. Gutman interviews for his articles are not unlike Ahmad Chalabi. They are smart and engaging advocates for the rebel cause. They understand that the only chance they have of unseating Assad is if the United States invades Syria and deposes the regime. They have concluded that only U.S. military action can remove Assad and bring victory to their cause. Mr. Gutman meets most of his opposition contacts at a coffee shop in Istanbul; where they spent hours offering him spectacular and detailed accounts of how the Syrian government bombed its own capital, assassinated its highest government security officials, and shaped the opposition to become Islamist and radical. All of this in order to convince the world that to defeat ISIS and al-Qaida, the Syrian regime must be destroyed. They must convince the West that Salafi-Jihadism in Syria is the product of Assad’s regime, not an outgrowth of Syrian society, the Sunni opposition, or the broader radicalization of the Islamist opposition in the Middle East since the ideology of Sayyid Qutb and Salafi-Jihadists begun to spread in the 1950s. The ISIS threat in Syria is a Frankenstein of Assad’s invention. “Kill Assad,” they seem to be saying, “and you will kill ISIS and win the war on terror. Moderate Syrians will take power & Syria will embrace American.” This is all too good to be true, of course. They insist that Assad’s war against jihadists is fake. Faithful to his sources, Roy Gutman argues that President Assad is not only in cahoots with ISIS, but that he “built ISIS.”

BU

Gutman relates that one opposition source explained that President Bashar al-Assad himself issued an order to remove roadblocks in Damascus so that a car bomber, claiming to be Nusra, could have easy access to a Damascus neighborhood, set off his huge explosion and make it look like the capital was being attacked by jihadists. This explosion was a false flag operation, Gutman argues, masterminded by Assad himself in order to deceive the world into believing that jihadists were a menace when they were not. Never mind that James Clapper, the director of U.S. National Intelligence, told Congress in mid-February that the explosions “had all the earmarks of an al Qaeda-like attack and so we believe al Qaeda in Iraq is extending its reach into Syria.” Never mind that Abu Muhammad al-Jawlani, the head of al-Qaida’s surrogate in Syria, the al-Nusra terrorist group, claimed responsibility for the explosion. Gutman insists that his source is telling the truth and everyone else, including the intelligence services of the United States are deceived by Assad propaganda. Why would U.S. news services publish these assertions? They make no sense. They reek of conspiracy theory, are transparently self-serving, and defy logic.

Assassination of Assef Shawkat, the President’s Brother-in-Law, 18 July 2012

Mr. Gutman’s sources are convinced that Iran, Syria’s closest ally, ordered the killing of Assad’s top security team. Not only do they speculate on who was behind the Damascus explosions, but they also attempt to deconstruct one of the most spectacular bombings that struck the inner circle of the Syrian leadership. On 18 July 2012 Assad’s Crisis Management Group was meeting at the heavily guarded National Security building in Rawda Square in central Damascus. Those killed included top members of Assad’s Crisis Group: Defense Minister Gen. Dawoud Rajha, his deputy, Assaf Shawkat, who was Assad’s brother-in-law, Major General Hisham Ikhtiyar, a top national security adviser to the president, and Gen. Hassan Turkmani, a former defense minister.

Gutman explains that Syrian Interior Minister Shaar placed a brief case against the wall in the room in order to blow up the security group. None of this makes sense, of course. Mr. Shaar stayed in the building, rather than escape. He blew himself up, severely injuring himself in the blast. He spent almost 40 days at Chami hospital in intensive care.

Ali Mamlouk, head of the Syrian intelligence apparatus

If this is not crazy enough, Mr. Gutman offers an even more preposterous story to explain why Iran would blow up its ally’s leading security chieftains. Gutman, once again quoting sources “within Assad’s entourage” insists that Iran killed Shawkat, the President’s relative, in order to place their own man, Ali Mamlouk, as the head of intelligence. All of this is preposterous. It includes stories about Assad’s mother and brother, who are part of this great plot. They are intimately involved in this family intrigue. How could Gutman’s low level defectors possibly know the details of this Assad family saga? The simple answer, of course, is they couldn’t. Gutman repeatedly expresses outrage and consternation at the perfidy and incompetence of the CIA for not debriefing his Syrian opposition contacts to find out the deepest secrets of the Assad regime that he has found out. The Daily Beast, which publishes Gutman’s revelations, shares his outrage. Little wonder that so many Americans are having a hard time figuring out how to evaluate the “post-truth” age, when their news organs feed them such pablum. How in the world could Iran, Assad and Hizbollah be winning this regional war against Turkey, the Gulf States, Israel and a large array of Sunni rebel militias if Iran were blowing up the leadership of its closest ally? Certainly, it is comforting to believe that one’s enemies are incompetent, malevolent killers, but could they really have maintained a thirty-five year alliance if they were busy killing off family members and security chieftains of each other? These sorts of explanations for what is happening in Syria beggar belief. Such conspiracy theories are attractive in the absence of facts. Here is what I can reconstruct from a few sources who in a position to know.

The Real Perpetrators of the Bombing of the Assad’s Crisis Group　

The only truth that Mr. Gutman’s sources told was that no one was “allowed to get close” to the investigation after the bombing. As we will see below, this would become an important factor in confirming the identity of the real perpetrators of the bombing.

The crisis group regularly assembled at the office of the National Security inside the Qiyade Qutriye (Central Command building) and not at Turkmani’s office as Mr. Gutman’s article posits. Nearly 3 months before the July 18^th bombing, an insider placed Mercury Cyanide inside the lentil soup that was offered to members of the crisis group. The poison almost killed Interior Minister Shaar and Turkmani. Asef Shawkat declined the soup dish and was not harmed. Following the incident, a decision was made to heighten security by regularly changing the meeting location. The offices of Hisham Ihtiyar and the Defense Minister became alternative venues for the meeting.

Nearly 7 months after the bombing, European diplomats, the identity of whom I have been asked not to disclose, called a meeting between a Syrian official and an opposition figure who insisted that he had been behind the assassination of Assef Shawkat. The reason that the European diplomats called for the meeting was to pressure President Assad and his generals to resign. They believed that the success of the opposition figure in assassinating so many top government officials would intimidate Assad and convince him to leave Syria. The opposition figure asked the Syrian official with whom he was meeting to relay to President Assad and his men that the opposition could assassinate him as surely as it has assassinated Assef Shawkat and the other principals of the regime.

In order to establish his credibility, the opposition figure explained in great detail how and where the bomb had been planted in the National Security building in Rawda. His details matched the evidence that was being uncovered by the regime investigation of the bombing and convinced its officials that the opposition figure was not bluffing. He knew that the bombs were placed in a suspended or drop ceiling that had been installed in the National Security room years earlier. A total of 5 explosives were placed inside the drop ceiling. One of the five did not explode. Such details were impossible for anyone outside the inner circle in Damascus to verify. It was clear that the opposition figure knew what he was talking about. The Syrian official quickly concluded that the opposition member, a Damascene

Syrian Defence Minister General Daoud Rajha

financier, had been involved in the bombing that killed the President’s brother-in-law. He went on to explain how Saudi Arabian officials had promised him a large sum of money that he later collected once the bombing had been successfully carried out. This was further confirmed when he described how he was able to recruit an Armenian officer who worked at Major General Hisham Ikhtiyar’s office to smuggle the explosives inside the building and use the adjacent office from which he was able to insert the bombs into the ceiling and have them placed into Mr. Ikhtiyar’s office, directly above the table around which the group convened. Fifteen minutes before the explosion, the Armenian officer left the building, claiming that he had to empty the garbage. He never returned. He had placed a timer in his office that triggered the explosion. He has never been seen again. His reward was $2 million out of the total of $7 million that was paid to the group. In 2012, barely a year into the Syrian crisis, the idea that the Syrian state might be the next government to fall in the Arab Spring was gaining momentum. With the probability of state collapse on the rise, it made sense for an Armenian officer and others like him to accept a $2 million payment in the hope starting a new life overseas.

Recall that officials from a European capital witnessed the meeting in which the Syrian financier explained to Syrian officials how he had executed the assassination of Asef Shawkat. They can confirm this entire account. Contrary to the speculations of Mr. Gutman’s sources, Iran was not involved in the bombing. The regime was not turning on itself. Assad’s closest ally was not assassinating Assad family members in order to gain control over Syria.

Iraq and the Jihadi Nexus:

Almost immediately after 9/11, Assad authorized his intelligence services to share many of their files on the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria and Europe. Late in 2002, Syrian intelligence helped disrupt an attack by al-Qaida on the headquarters of the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet in Bahrain. Assad then also agreed to house suspected terrorists for the CIA in Syrian prisons.  This developing collaboration between Damascus and Washington based on having al-Qaida as a common enemy was soon to go cold after Assad begun to publicly oppose the Iraq war.  George W. Bush soon responded by linking Syria to   an ‘axis of evil’ containing Iraq, Iran and North Korea.  With the Iraq invasion gathering force, both the Syrian leadership and their Islamist enemies started to plan for the possibility that Damascus could be next after Iraq. The Syrian Islamist militants started to move to the north east of the country ahead of the American invasion of Iraq. They planned to fill the void should the Syrian state become the next target of the U.S. The Syrian state was becoming equally convinced of the American plans towards Syria. It was the head of one of the Intelligence agencies who soon saw an opportunity in infiltrating those Islamists moving to the border and then organizing them to move into Iraq rather than wait for the Americans to cross into Syria.  This plan meant that those who cross into Iraq to fight are known to Syrian intelligence when they cross back into Syria. It was through this system that Syrian prisons saw a nearly 10 fold increase in jihadist ranks. These hardened fighters were to spread their ideology throughout an overcrowded and largely mismanaged Syrian prison system infecting the minds of many none jihadist Syrians in the process.

Flirting With the Islamists:

Since fighting an earlier war with the Moslem Brotherhood in the early 1980’s, Syrian jails have been home to many Islamists. Syrian security agencies have traditionally trumped the Syrian justice system when it comes to the final say on the length of stay of those arrested. Often, when the justice system sentenced a person, the security services had the authority to ignore the end of the sentence by invoking “national security” concerns. This meant that many of those in prison were there beyond their legal stay. Scores of families never got to see their loved ones even after their original legal sentences were over.

Zahran Alloush, Leader of opposition militia, the Islamic Army. See this article about his ideology and beliefs

As the events in Daraa unfolded, the President invited key figures from the town to see what can be done to calm the demonstrations. One such figure was cleric Sayasneh. One of the consistent demands of such meetings was the release of prisoners. It was no different when Douma joined the uprising. Foreign Embassies were also pushing the Syrian State to release what it called political prisoners. People like Zahran Alloush were sentenced to seven years in prison when he was arrested with a group of 40 people on the charge of promoting Wahhabi ideology and gun possession.  They had not killed anyone or even fired a shot. Yet, they were sent to prisons like Sednaya and kept there beyond the end of their sentence on the whim of one of the security agencies.  It was in this context when the residents of Douma demanded the release of prisoners from their districts. The Syrian leadership was under intense pressure to calm the crisis. The people of Douma promised to do their job at calming their own streets if some of those prisoners were released.  Zahran and many others like him were released under this rationale. This is not too dissimilar to the way the American prisons in Iraq worked. Zarqawi, Baghdadi and Golani were all released from those prisons either when their terms ended or when the local populations demanded their release. Just like in Syrian prisons, the prisoners in American jails were also indoctrinated with jihadist ideology. Syria erred by releasing Alloush and Abboud who would go on to form Jeish al Islam and Ahrar just like the U.S. erred when it released Baghdadi who would go on to form ISIS.

The Aleppo Central Prison:

One of the longest standoffs between the Syrian Army and armed groups was at the Aleppo prison complex.  Nearly 3,000 inmates and 500 Syrian police and soldiers were trapped inside the prison for close to 3 years by armed militias that regularly shelled it. Like so many similar regime-opposition standoffs, intense negotiations were regularly attempted between the two sides. Mr. Fedaa Majzoub, an Australian citizen, was the point man in the negotiations between the two sides. One of the key demands of al-Nusra and Ahrar al Sham, the two militias that led the seige of the Aleppo prison, was the release of 80 jihadist comrades that were amongst the 3000 inmates. Had Damascus been following a strategy of releasing jihadists from Al Qaeda and the like onto Syrian streets to change the image of the uprising as suggested by the sources of Mr. Gutman’s article, there was never a better opportunity to do so by Assad. Instead of yielding to the demands of the negotiator to release the 80 jihadists, the Syrian leadership chose instead to defend the complex for resulting in a standoff that lasted nearly three years.

Almost since the start of the Syrian crisis, the debate on the timing of the radicalization of the conflict still rages on.  Supporters of the Syrian opposition refer to articles like Mr. Gutman’s to portray a peaceful uprising that Damascus desperately tried to radicalize through all means possible. Such sinister attempts were thought to include colluding with terrorists and releasing from their jails as well as bombing its own capital to prove a point. Loyalists and leadership insiders, on the other hand, believe that the uprising was radicalized very early on after the initial events were quickly hijacked by Islamists who had sat waiting for decades for this moment to start. Based on extensive personal conversations with ex White House officials, there seems to be a consensus that the defining moment of this debate was the incident that occurred at the town of Jisr al –Shugour in June of 2011. This is when 120 soldiers were killed between 3 and 6 June. Opposition activists say it was one part of the army firing on another for refusing to kill protesters. Thousands of miles away in Washington, American officials were already eavesdropping on Syrian opposition and others. On Friday June 3^rd, White House officials knew that those soldiers were shot and killed by the opposition as the latter used various communication devices to boast about the incident. One particular official became convinced that the response of Damascus will be swift and devastating. He therefore decided to be at his desk over the weekend to monitor the situation. The weekend passed with no such response by Damascus. By Monday, officials at the White House were pleasantly surprised. Their worst fears of a harsh crackdown were never materialized. Over the coming weeks and months those early thoughts turned to be wishful thinking as Syria soon descended into its black tunnel.

[End]

Joshua Landis and Roy Gutman debate the notion that Assad helped create ISIS and planned false flag operations to bomb Damascus on “NPR’s To The Point”

By Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi

Emblem of Saraya al-Tawheed. In the centre is the symbol of the Hizb al-Tawhid al-Arabi (“Arab Unity Party”), the political wing of Saraya al-Tawheed.

The involvement of the Arab Unity Party- primarily supported by Lebanese Druze opposed to Walid Jumblatt- and its leader Wi’am Wahhab in the Syrian civil war has long been known, as Wahhab and his party have played a role in organizing forces in support of the Assad regime among Syrian Druze. Indeed, the Arab Unity Party has openly identified a militia called the Ammar bin Yasir Battalion as its affiliate operating in Syria, claiming ‘martyrs’ on fighting fronts in both Suwayda’ and Quneitra provinces as part of efforts to defend Druze areas.

However, more recently another armed affiliate of the Arab Unity Party has come to attention: Saraya al-Tawheed (“The Unity Brigades”). The group received widespread coverage in the Arabic press for a parade and festival held in the Lebanese locality of al-Jahiliya (Wahhab’s hometown) in late November 2016. According to the Lebanese newspaper al-Diyar (which is pro-Assad), the event was attended by a variety of notables from both Lebanon and Syria: “Representatives from diplomatic commissions, national parties, heads of municipalities and elective commissions in all the regions and villages of Chouf and Aley, as well as a number of the mashayakh [Druze sheikhs] in Hasbaya, Rashaya, Aley and Matn, along with mashayakh from Suwayda’, Jabal al-Arab and Jabal al-Sheikh, and popular delegations from all regions of Chouf, Aley, Rashaya and Hasbaya.”

Among those attending was Mahmoud Qamiti, a member of the political office of Hezbollah, which is an ally of the Arab Unity Party. Echoing familiar ‘resistance’ axis discourse, Qamiti affirmed:

“Our honour will only be the honour of confronting the occupation and confronting the conspiracy, the Western-American project, the takfiri enemy and the Israeli enemy. Our honour is from Palestine and in Palestine, from Gaza and in Gaza, and in all the land of Palestine. Our honour is in Syria and in the face of the conspiracy against Syria, and our honour is in the resistance.”

For some context, takfiri refers to the one who declare others to be disbelievers, even when they profess to be Muslims. In the discourse of Hezbollah and the ‘resistance’ axis, the term is often used to refer to the wider Sunni insurgency in Syria, which, to be sure, harbours considerable anti-Shi’a sentiment to the point of pronouncing Shi’a to be non-Muslims. Qamiti also took the opportunity to emphasize the supposed role of the ‘resistance’ in protecting Lebanon, working alongside the Lebanese army and the security apparatus. Finally, Qamiti appealed to the Druze in the Golan as well as Jabal al-Arab and Jabal al-Sheikh, saying that they are “our brothers and allies in the resistance and working to the protect the Golan and Syria.”

For his own part, Wi’am Wahhab outlined the supposed role of Saraya al-Tawheed, clarifying that the group does not comprise “military or security brigades, or terrorist as the anxiously afraid say, but rather brigades of the coming change, the stormy change, the change towards a better tomorrow for us, our mountain and our people from Iqlim al-Kharoub to the last mountain and last patch of eart in Lebanon, from the south to the north: they are civilian brigades, rejecting the use of weapons except in self-defence and supporting the Lebanese army and the security forces if anything requires that, and confronting any ‘Israeli’ aggression. They are part of the resistance.” Wahhab also highlighted his solidarity with the Assad regime, the Syrian army, “the Lebanese resistance” that has stood by Assad, and the Druze communities in Syria that have fended off rebel assaults (e.g. Hadr in Quneitra). Wahhab further took the opportunity to address his rival Walid Jumblatt, calling on him and others to come together “in solidarity under the banner of the mashaykh and not under the banner of anyone else.”

Here, it is worth noting two points with regards to Saraya al-Tawheed. First, the group did not suddenly come into existence last month. Rather, the groundwork was being laid for months prior to the parade and event in al-Jahiliya. According to the official for the Saraya al-Tawheed Facebook page who spoke with me, Saraya al-Tawheed was established six months ago. Indeed, in October 2016 the group was discussed in an article in the Lebanese newspaper al-Nahar, in which the Arab Unity Party’s media director Hisham al-Awar made clear that the outlining of the framework and aims had already begun some time ago  and that there were plans to hold a Saraya al-Tawheed parade on 20 November (as reported above) as part of “a celebration of solidarity with our Arab people in the occupied Golan, Jabal al-Sheikh and Jabal al-Arab”- all areas inhabited by Syrian Druze.

In the same discussion with al-Nahar, al-Awar claimed that Saraya al-Tawheed already had “hundreds of members” not limited to Druze areas only, and that there were young women in the group as well. According to al-Awar, the notion of women being encouraged to join Saraya al-Tawheed was partly based on what Wahhab saw on his last visit to Hadr, in that a group of young women were apparently fighting in the area (cf. Labawat al-Jabal in Suwayda’). On the subject of whether there were links with Hezbollah’s Saraya al-Muqawama (“The Resistance Brigades”) that recruits non-Shi’a, al-Awar said that while the aims of Saraya al-Tawheed and Saraya al-Muqawama may overlap in many respects, Saraya al-Tawheed is “independent with its own framework, assignments, responsibilities and administrative organization.”

The second important point to make is that Saraya al-Tawheed’s scope is not limited to Lebanon, even as the Arab Unity Party’s messaging at the present time has largely focused on the idea of Saraya al-Tawheed as a youth group and support force for the Lebanese army and security forces to defend against attacks on Lebanon. The same official for the Saraya al-Tawheed Facebook page affirmed to me that “Saraya al-Tawheed in Syria is defending the land and honour in the localities and villages, particularly in Hadr and Suwayda’.” The members of Saraya al-Tawheed in Syria, according to this source, are “of Syrian origin.” A photo circulated on 24 November appears to show members of Saraya al-Tawheed in the Hadr area, put out with a caption on a Wi’am Wahhab Facebook page: “Tribute to Saraya al-Tawheed in Hadr who have prevented the terrorists from entering the locality with the participation of the rest of their brothers, mashaykh and people.”

Photo said to be of Saraya al-Tawheed members in the Hadr area. Note that the men are posing in front of a poster of Wi’am Wahhab.

It may then be asked what the difference is between Saraya al-Tawheed and the Ammar bin Yasir Battalion. Well, not much, really. As per the official for the Saraya al-Tawheed Facebook page, the Ammar bin Yasir Battalion has supposedly been around since “the July war until today,” whereas Saraya al-Tawheed is a newer formation, even as both groups are “two faces of one coin.” The July war, known in Arabic as Harb Tamuz, refers to the conflict between Israel and Lebanon that began in July 2006 after Hezbollah attacked a group of Israeli soldiers. These events took place soon after the initial foundations of the Arab Unity Party in late May 2006. It should be noted that there appears to be no public information attesting to the existence of the Ammar bin Yasir Battalion as far back as 2006, though that does not necessarily mean it did not exist at that point. For comparison, the Iraqi militia and political faction Saraya al-Khorasani only really came to public light at first in 2013 with its involvement in the Syrian civil war but in reality, as subsequent information that has come to light has shown, it has roots going back much further to the 1980s and 1990s. Another case for comparison might be the Syrian Hezbollah faction called the National Ideological Resistance, which, as its leader claimed to me in an interview in 2014, has roots going back to mid-2009. Of course, there could be a degree of rhetorical exaggeration here, but one must not automatically assume that a movement comes into being simply when it begins announcing its existence on contemporary social media.

The most likely motivation for the establishment of Saraya al-Tawheed is that it ostensibly represents more than just a mere militia amid a Lebanese political climate that may be wary of new militias that simply display shows of armed force. In contrast, the Ammar bin Yasir Battalion is something that has been very low-key apart from the claiming of ‘martyrs’ in Syria and cannot necessarily be presented as something beyond an armed group/militia. Wahhab also presents Saraya al-Tawheed as embodying something analogous to sports associations, while emphasizing a defensive function in support of the Lebanese state and within the framework of the law.

Accordingly, Saraya al-Tawheed can perhaps be seen as more useful than the Ammar bin Yasir Battalion in terms of being a means of asserting greater political influence in Syria and Lebanon, by functioning as both a militia force and a form of wider social outreach. To conclude, an analogue here might be the Lebanese branch of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP), which has a militia in the form of Nusur al-Zawba’a that has been fighting in support of the Assad regime in Syria and presenting itself as defending Lebanon, while engaging in wider social outreach in its zones of influence and control. The Lebanese SSNP has been able to extend its influence deep into regime-held Syria in particular, especially among the Christian populations in Homs and Hama. Perhaps the Arab Unity Party could achieve something similar with the Druze populations in Syria through the Saraya al-Tawheed project.

By Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi

Emblem of Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar, featuring Syria as the main part of the emblem and the group’s name beneath it.

The predominantly Druze province of Suwayda’ in southern Syria has a variety of militia factions, some of which lean more third-way and reformist from within (most notably the Rijal al-Karama movement) and others of a more Assad regime loyalist orientation. Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar (“Guardians of the Abode Battalions,” whose name references the Syrian national anthem Humat al-Diyar) represents one of the latter factions. It is led by Nazih Jerbo’ (Abu Hussein), who is a relative of Sheikh Yusuf Jerbo’, one of the three Mashayakh al-‘Aql representing the highest religious authorities among the Druze in Syria. On account of the Mashayakh al-‘Aql’s links with the regime, Sheikh Yusuf Jerbo’, who succeeded Nazih’s father Hussein on the latter’s death in December 2012, is firmly on the regime’s side and indeed has played an important role in the building of Dir’ al-Watan, a pro-regime formation in Suwayda’ province that was set up more recently than Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar. According to Samir al-Shabali, who led a Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar contingent in the Suwayda’ village of Ariqa but is now in the Kata’ib al-Ba’ath (“Ba’ath Brigades”), Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar’s origins date much further back to 2012.

Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar Ariqa contingent placard, featuring Bashar al-Assad’s portrait. Photo from June 2014.

Photo featuring members of Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar with the group’s logo on their jackets. The post says: “Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar: groups of lions of Suwayda’ spread in all regions of the province to protect it from any emergency to which Suwayda’ might be exposed during the past two days.” Indeed, according to the media director for Rijal al-Karama, Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar has been around for a long time and has “many people” in its ranks, though he adds that the National Defence Forces in Suwayda’ province is bigger than Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar. One member of Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar claimed that the formation has 2000 fighters.

Considering Nazih Jerbo’s relation with Sheikh Yusuf Jerbo’, it is unsurprising that Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar also reflects a regime loyalist position. This stance is made very clear in the group’s social media output. For example, in August 2015, Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar advertised a visit to its base from the Arab Unity Party “to affirm shared positions in protecting the mountain [Jabal al-Arab/Druze: Suwayda’].” For context, note that the Arab Unity Party (Hizb al-Tawhid al-Arabi) is a Lebanese party primarily supported by Druze opposed to Walid Jumblatt, who has come out against Bashar al-Assad during the Syrian civil war. The leader of the Arab Unity Party- Wiam Wahhab- has played a notable role over the past few years in organizing efforts in Suwayda’ province in defence of the regime. Indeed, the group even has a militia fighting in Syria- under the monikers of Katibat Ammar bin Yasir and the “Arab Tawhidi Resistance”- that has claimed ‘martyrs’ in fighting in northern Suwayda’ in summer 2014 (though note the particular individuals named were also presented as ‘martyrs’ of the Popular Committees) and more recently in the Druze area of Hadr in Quneitra province in November 2016. The reference to Ammar bin Yasir- one of the companions of the Prophet- is a reflection of Ammar bin Yasir’s importance in the Druze faith, while Tawhidi can refer to the “Unity” part of Wiam Wahhab’s party, as well as the fact that Druze call themselves Muwahhideen (“monotheists”: like Tawhid, based on the same derivative form of Arabic root w-h-d). The “Resistance” aspect clearly references the notion of the regional “resistance” axis supporting the regime.

Photo from the post concerning the visit of the Arab Unity Party to Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar’s base. Note the portrait of Bashar al-Assad in the background.

Besides the meeting with the Arab Unity Party itself, Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar has participated in events convened by other factions supporting the regime in Suwayda’, such as the Syrian Social Nationalist Party, which has an important base of support in Suwayda’ province and opened a new base in Ariqa in July 2015, an event that was also attended by the National Defence Forces, Ba’ath Brigades and a local faction known as the Ammar bin Yasir group, an obvious reference in this case to the shrine in Ariqa for Ammar bin Yasir. According to Samir al-Shabali, this Ammar bin Yasir group is independent and relies on arming from local people. Therefore it should not be confused with the Arab Unity Party’s Katibat Ammar bin Yasir that is fighting in Syria.

Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar has engaged in other forms of local outreach such as through  hosting local sheikhs for meetings, who have visited both the group’s base and the house of Nazih Jerbo’. These meetings, advertised in June and August 2015 respectively, partly reflected the same and familiar rhetorical stances, such as standing united against threats from “terrorism” and/or the “enemies of the homeland,” while warning against fitna (“strife”). The concept of fitna is a common talking point within discourse in Suwayda’ province, referring most notably to the dangers posed by internal partisan rivalries that can distract from threats that the province is facing from outside forces such as the rebels to the west in Deraa province and the Islamic State to the northeast. This is particularly relevant in the case of the competition for influence between Rijal al-Karama and the loyalist factions in Suwayda’ province.

Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar’s activities on the ground, as promoted by the militia itself, primarily concern maintaining internal security in Suwayda’ province including inside Suwayda’ city alongside popular committee militias that are also aligned with the regime. The main military engagement that appears to have been claimed by the militia outside Suwayda’ province thus far came amid the mobilization of Syrian Druze to defend the village of Hadr  after the rebels launched a new offensive in the area in September 2016.

Though the maintenance of internal security has included battles within Suwayda’ province such as one in May 2015 that was fought in the Haqaf area in eastern Suwayda’ province in coordination with multiple factions (including Rijal al-Karama) against the Islamic State, Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar mainly seems to focus on confiscating smuggled goods, such as medicines, drugs and oil. Portraying itself as a group upholding the state and the nation, Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar says that the medicines and oil in particular are bound for areas like Deraa under rebel control, and thus the smugglers are bartering with people’s lives and the nation’s existence for the sake of profiteering. In the case of smuggled medicines, in May 2015 the group claimed that its leader directed sending confiscated medicines to the health directorate in Suwayda’ by the agreement of Atef al-Nadaf, the provincial governor at the time. These medicines were then to be distributed to the various health centres in the province in order to help the children and sick.

However, like many militias in the Syrian civil war, Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar faces accusations of criminal behaviour and acting outside the rule of law. For example, the anti-regime leaning Arab Druze Identity Movement, also known as The Identity Movement in Jabal al-Arab, wrote in May 2016 that one of the members of Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar killed a person from the village of al-Dur following a driving incident, but has been able to find safe refuge thanks to his affiliation with the militia. This event, the group adds, follows on from one last year in which the militia killed someone from the Murshid family. The latter incident involved the killing of a university student called Murad Sanad Murshid as armed men who had set up a checkpoint opened fire on his car. The exact identity of the perpetrators appears to be disputed. One account from the time of the incident in July 2015 says that the perpetrators were from the Kata’ib al-Ba’ath, though adds that the deceased’s family initially thought Nazih Jerbo’s men were responsible and accordingly attacked his home. It was partly in this context that the meeting with local sheikhs advertised in August 2015 by Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar came about, whereby sheikhs from the deceased person’s village of Haran came to the house of Nazih Jerbo’. In a similar vein, the meeting advertised by the militia in June 2015 partly referred to another controversy in which Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar was accused of arresting, torturing and killing a few people from the Bedouin minority on the grounds of bombarding Suwayda’ city. Again, as with the July 2015 incident, the identity of the perpetrators is disputed, with some accounts holding that it was actually al-Amn al-Askari (The Military Security: i.e. Military Intelligence) that carried out these acts and then accused Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar, which denied any wrongdoing.

Even so, Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar is accused of being one of the leading groups relied on by the regional al-Amn al-Askari head Wafiq Nasir for kidnapping operations in Suwayda’ province, a lucrative business said to be worth more than 850,000,000 Syrian pounds in the province in terms of ransoms paid. Also, despite the anti-smuggling image of the group, allegations also exist of certain members’ involvement in profiteering through setting up checkpoints to allow smugglers to pass (e.g. here) or similar involvement in smuggling operations deemed detrimental to the security of the province (cf. here).

In any case, this overview of Kata’ib Humat al-Diyar illustrates that the influence and size of the loyalist factions in Suwayda’ province should not be underestimated, despite the growth of Rijal al-Karama. Indeed, third-way leaning groups cannot afford full-blown open confrontation with the loyalist groups as it would simply prove too costly, and ultimately the priority must be to defend Suwayda’ province from external attack. As the media director for Rijal al-Karama put it, “In the event of an external attack on the Jabal, all factions unite.”

Anjem Choudhary, 49, founder of Sharia4UK convicted for supporting the Islamic State.

@tamhussein

Recently, Anjem Choudhary, 49, and Mizanur Rahman, 33, were imprisoned for their active support of the Islamic State. Choudhary’s imprisonment ends, for a small period at least, his decade plus history of agitation in the UK. Whilst the British press lapped up his colourful and extreme pronouncements, his influence amongst the majority of UK Muslims was minimal. At best he is seen by most British Muslims as a rabble-rouser and a demagogue. However, Choudhary’s influence outside of the UK has been greatly underestimated. The East London solicitor was considered a Mufti by some of his followers. He was seen as a man who spoke the Truth to power like a modern day Moses to the secular Pharaoh. He is the founding father of Shariah4UK, an organisation which gave birth to other franchises like Shariah4Belgium whose members became linked to the attacks in Brussels.

The judge, whilst sentencing, was fully aware of Choudhary’s influence and the impact he could have on the prison population. One prison staff member who wanted to remain anonymous told me most inmates are “poor, vulnerable and aggrieved” and ripe for radicalisation. He added that “if there is a confident personality he can turn them. I mean some of these guys actually believe in David Icke!” Thus charismatic prisoners who question authority, whether that be by Far-Right activists, Salafi-Jihadists, Irish Republicans or conspiracy theorists for that matter, can influence prisoners. And it seems plausible that the magic of Choudhary can have the same effect in prison. Choudhary himself has boasted that he will radicalise prison inmates.

On the face of it, it seems sensible that he spends most of his time in prison isolated. Especially as there is growing evidence that there is a link between criminality and ISIS, as has been shown by the likes of Callimachi and others. According to Robert Verkaik, Aine Davies was radicalised in prison, Jafar Turay, another fighter, is believed to have been radicalised by a Ladbroke Grove jihadist and so on. Martin Chulov has also shown how networks develop within prisons. Indeed many of the links of Syrian Islamists and Jihadists were forged in Saydnaya prison in Syria. However, whilst acknowledging that prisons can be incubators of extremist ideologies of all sorts, does it warrant a response that exceptionalises Muslim prisoners and shows them to be different from the rest of the prison population? Might that not be counter-productive? Prison experiences after all can contribute to an individual’s radicalisation, as Lawrence Wright writes in the Looming Tower:

“America’s tragedy on September 11 was born in the Prisons of Egypt. Human-Rights advocates in Cairo argue that torture created an appetite for revenge, first in Syed Qutb and later in his acolytes, including Ayman al-Zawahiri.”

Admittedly, UK prisons are relatively humane in comparison to the brutal prisons of Syria, Egypt and Iraq, but a misstep can have disastrous consequences. It is therefore absolutely crucial to get the balance right and understand how and to what extent radicalisation occurs in prisons.

It is with this in mind that I interviewed former UK Terror charge inmates to explore the idea. The sample is qualitative and hopes to add to our understanding of how radicalisation occurs in prison.

Case study: Ahmed* [name changed]

I met Ahmed in an Italian Gelateria in Westbourne Grove, West London. The convicted terrorist could be a boxer or a doorman standing outside a seedy nightclub in Leicester Square. His thick fingers, thick neck, thick arms should be throwing out some punter who has had one too many. But he is what he has always claimed to be; at best an intellectual at worst an Ossipon like figure from Conrad’s The Secret Agent, a propagandist disseminator. The man devours books; bookshops to him are like cameras to the Kardashians; he just can’t resist them. In Prison he read Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace, Hallaq’s the Impossible State and his favourite-the Count of Monte Cristo. He has this enigmatic smile that doesn’t care what you do to him. It is as if he was challenging the authorities: what could you possible do to me here in the UK that you haven’t done already? He’s done six years of prison, two years were spent in the High Security Unit, Belmarsh or as it is known by its inmates, the Unit. He has shared his association time with some of Britain’s most notorious killers and Terror-Charge prisoners from Kenny Noye, Colin Gunn to Dhiren Barot, the man who plotted to take down the New York Stock exchange and others like Muktar Said Ibrahim responsible for the 21 July plot of 2005.

Belmarsh prison

Belmarsh became operational in 1992. It was intended to be the securest prison in the country and designed to house IRA prisoners. By its critics it was dubbed the UK’s Guantanamo but in fairness Guantanamo doesn’t offer counselling, therapy sessions and podiatry like Belmarsh. To Ahmed, though,  Belmarsh wasn’t a holiday camp. He recalls an anecdote that Brian Wright told him:

“The nuttiest person is the person who designed this unit, you can’t hide anything you can’t kill anyone or even kill yourself he told me. The whole place is made of metal and the guards check on you every hour making a note on whether you are still there. The sound of the little window opening drives you nuts at first.”

The Unit, he recalls “was designed to break you down.” Everything is bad. In the morning you are given a small box of cereals, lunch is merely one of those shadows of reality that Plato talks about and dinner need not be discussed. But UK prisons are not the ones experienced by Dostoyevsky nor Solzhenitsyn’s Ivan Denisovich. Ahmed knows very well that Belmarsh is a far cry from Chateaux D’if or Assad’s Tadmor prison. It is twenty two or three hour lock up, with a small square where you can do some exercise. But the twenty yards to the exercise area takes a full twenty minutes to get to, the prisoner is escorted, buzzed through thirteen doors and patted down thirteen doors. Ahmed finds it absurd but then again, considering the company he keeps, it is understandable. The gym is “a shambles designed in a way so that the weights can’t be used as a weapon”. The library consists of a set of shelves on wheels which is called without irony, a mobile library. At the Unit, according to Ahmed, the wardens or ‘screws’ don’t punish you, they just behave vindictively. In the summer they make the water scalding hot so it peals your skin off and in the winter it is ice cold and the wardens always blame the maintenance crews. “We all knew” says Ahmed, “that this was just a game, because the other spurs had nice temperate water to shower in during association.”

Cerie Bullivant who spent 2007-2008 in Belmarsh and Wandsworth on remand seemed to confirm Ahmed’s view:

“I would be praying during Ramadan with another brother in my cell and they would kick off about it. Whilst in the other cell there would be four non-Muslim inmates playing music and it would be absolutely fine. It goes both ways though, during Ramadan Muslim inmates would get special food packs to break their fasts and the non-Muslim inmates would complain. There was a lot of tension between the Muslim and the non-Muslim inmates.”

If they do want to punish an inmate then they send in the DST, Detailed Search Team. Ahmed’s face changes into one of contempt and laughter as he recalled them:

“They come in dressed from top to bottom in black, they are often in riot gear, usually at some odd hour, three in the morning. As soon as they enter, they step up to you. They rip up your cell, I have been raided many times, they pour shampoo on your clothes, they took my Quran CD given to me by the Prison chaplain and they scratched it. Why? What did the CD ever do to you? I can’t forget the Quran CD given to me by the prison imam. They steal your papers. They check your arse…you bend over and they stick their heads down and look into your arse [laughs]…sometimes with a mirror what sort of human does that looking for a phone in your arse!? If they want to beat you up they will take you to the segregation unit, and over there they will beat you up because it’s isolated.”

Prison life is not all boredom though, there are things you can do in prison. Ahmed read and worked on his case. A lot of T-Charge prisoners work on their case or their appeals. “As long as they are in prison there is hope” he says because one day they can get out. Many of the T-Charge prisoners keep their spirits up by worshipping because in here you needed God the most. Here T-Charge prisoners see themselves and are viewed by the rest, not as common criminals but political prisoners. They are kings without crowns.

Bullivant recalls a story in Wandsworth:

“There used to be these Algerians who used to bring in drugs into the prisons and do lines [taking Cocaine]. Because I was a convert and a T-Charge they would tell me that if anyone messes with me I should tell them because they would kill them…there’s always been a hierarchy in prison.”

The T-Charge prisoners see themselves as different. They don’t hustle, they don’t carry on like “low life crims”.

Bullivant says:

“They have manners and are generous: One brother would save up all his money and buy sauces, sweets and food for Ramadan and then give them out to non-Muslims and Muslims during the month. He won a lot of friends that way.”

They also have examples to emulate, these men are fully aware that many of the Prophets spent time in prison, Joseph in the dungeons of the Pharaoh, Jonah in the belly of the Leviathan and so their situation relatively speaking doesn’t seem that bad. Moreover Syed Qutb, Omar Mokhtar, Malcolm X, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Zarqawi and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi; Muslims from all over the spectrum whether that be freedom fighters, radicals, extremists and terrorists have all done bird. So for some inmates it reconfirmed the very rightness of their cause. They were following in the right footsteps. Especially as there is a well known Prophetic tradition that says when God loves someone, He afflicts them with tribulation, and so their incarceration is interpreted as such.

Ayman al-Zawahiri was regularly tortured and beaten by the Egyptian authorities in prison.

In fact for the likes of Ahmed, prison merely reinforced the view that he was right otherwise why would the system try to imprison him and put him in the Unit? “Even Dhiren Bharot” he says, “told me: Why are you in here? You are so young?” The harsh sentence he received, whether correct or not, he believes is a reflection of this politically motivated witch-hunt against his politics. Thus prison to him was a confirmation of the righteousness of his chosen path rather than punishment. “If I was a terrorist” he says eating his crepe, “why don’t they kill me?” Any other state would. The Islamic State certainly would. Ahmed accepts his own extinction as fair game. It is the bargain that he made from the time Iraq was invaded in 2003. In fact, this softness, this woolliness, this dare I say it, half-way house of not dealing with his likes makes him disrespect the UK. One wonders whether the UK knows how to deal with prisoners with such grand ideas anymore.

So are prisons places of radicalisation- that catch all ill defined term that seems to apply mostly to Muslims? The fact that Muslim prisoners should resort to their faith is hardly surprising; it is part of the human condition but how it occurs has mystified analysts. Ahmed recalls a far right white inmate who adopted the name Omar Jones simply because he read everything and anything he could get his paws on. He grabbed some Islamic literature from a Muslim inmate who was throwing them away. The Muslim inmate even tried to dissuade Jones, it wasn’t his type of literature. But Omar insisted on reading the material and within a week he had converted to Islam.

When an inmate converts the first priority are the basics, how to pray, how to make ablution, how to recite verses of the Quran. And so the convert would go to the T-Charge inmates during Association, the hour when inmates get to socialise. According to Ahmed, he never witnessed any radicalisation of new converts. The most these T-Charge prisoners did was to teach the new convert the basics. As Bullivant puts it: “That’s not radicalisation, that’s brotherhood.”

A convert like Omar would search out the most ‘righteous’ T-Charge prisoner because they were different in the same way the Protagonist from Dostoyevsky’s House of the Dead admired the Chechens for their political principles and upright characters. He like Omar Jones, recognised that those prisoners were there due to their beliefs, not because they were lowlife criminals that had murdered, raped and looted for the sake of criminal gain. Their manners were usually better, they didn’t swear, they offered hospitality for three days whenever a new ‘brother’ came in to the ward as is Muslim custom.

They looked after you like Abbè Faria did to Edmond Dantes in the Count of Monte Cristo. And perhaps the most important point here is that Omar Jones instinctively recognised that T-Charge prisoners were on the right side of the fence. In other words, they were not employees like prison wardens or chaplains and imams. One should not underestimate the role of the charismatic personality, as Haroro Ingram has pointed out. Islamic tradition fosters charismatic leadership and the idea of transformative charisma. Zarqawi inspired intense loyalty in prison precisely because he took the punishment on behalf of his group whenever the group would receive one. It was not his learning but his loyalty to his men. It didn’t matter if you were the most knowledgable prison imam, the simple fact was you were on the wrong side. It’s not that the imams didn’t do their jobs, they started off on the wrong side of the fence in the first place. It takes a special type of Prison chaplain to get through to inmates. How they could even influence Muslims, converts and others was beyond Ahmed. All they were good for it seems was for official matters, you registered your conversion with him so you got on the Halal list.

As Bullivant says:

“No one trusted the prison imams. You were polite and respectful and you went to him when you needed a Quran or a prayer carpet. On Fridays you didn’t go to listen to the Friday Khutba [Sermon] but to catch up with the rest of the brothers from the other wards. It was the only day you could see each other.”

Ahmed doesn’t deny that radicalisation does happen but questions the way it has been portrayed in the media. According to him, T-Charge prisoners become symbols and reference points for the convert prisoners. These men would be their example and guide for their time in prison, not the prison chaplain who according to Ahmed, was well meaning but was “mostly hit and miss”.

Bullivant, speaking about remand prisons, explains it in a different way. “The Brother’s talked about dīnī [religious] stuff but they rarely talked about politics. Everyone was paranoid that the cell was bugged.” In any case, he adds, “in remand you had hope of getting out…politics didn’t come into it. Most inmates will do dawah [proselytise Islam] because what else can you do? You have nothing else. But of course everyone was aware of the injustices outside. It was unspoken, no need to say it.” Religious proselytisation might be seen as radicalisation by the authorities, but proselytisation happened in Dostoyevsky’s House of the Dead and will continue for as long as prison exists. For Muslim inmates, it wasn’t a case of directly recruiting inmates to a cause, rather it was viewed within a religious architecture: souls needed saving even in prison, perhaps even more so. Ahmed recalls one of the inmates:

“An Afro-Caribbean brother, the nicest guy in the world. The brother had beautiful akhlāq [manners]. He used to be a hitman, bodies turned up all over Europe wherever he went. After his conversion he became the most pious brother I knew.”

But saving souls comes with baggage.  According to Bullivant, the inmate who had a hand in another’s inmate’s conversion could be blamed by the Prison service for radicalising inmates.  It might count against him in upcoming parole hearings or he might be moved to another prison.

This is confirmed by Ahmed too, if an inmate converts to Islam he is immediately viewed as radicalised. But sometimes they become devout purely on their own as he recalls:

“There was one young brother, he was half-Pakistani, half-English, killed a man because he put his hands on his sister’s thighs. He stabbed people left right and centre and ended up in the Whitemore unit, he offered to deal with anyone who threatened T-charge prisoners, ‘do you want me to stab him up?’ he used to ask me and I would calm the brother down. But then I received letters from him in perfect written Arabic, he had become fluent in written Arabic in eight months, he had taught himself.”

Of course some converted to Islam because they wanted to be part of the gang that had the most clout, the ones who could protect you. But usually you could spot those ones. Ahmed had little respect for those kinds of prisoners. According to him it showed on their faces, in their eyes they were low life scums who used Islam as veil. No one bought the argument that their drug dealing and criminal activities was a tool to harm the infidel enemy. There was no conviction in these men and he didn’t respect it.

Neither Ahmed nor Bullivant deny that T-Charge prisoners ran things in prison. Cream rises to the top and there are emirs, albeit unofficial ones in British prisons just as much as there are capos, dons, bosses in prisons all around the world. Networks do exist. Word spreads pretty quickly amongst prisoners, who is coming through to which wing and why. During Association, even if a murder or a robbery had occurred on the outside, the prisoners would know about it and sometimes they even knew who did it before the police.

If an emir didn’t want a certain prisoner in his wing he could make it such that the prisoner would be segregated or moved to a different wing. If there’s an inmate who attacked a ‘brother‘ and is being transferred to his wing,  the emir would ensure that the inmate gets beaten up, stabbed or smashed with a contraption that resembles a morning star made out of two cans of tuna in a sock as punishment for that transgression. They might wait for the prisoner to get settled in and one day pour boiling sugar syrup on him. The syrup behaves a bit like napalm and sticks your skin scalding it permanently. Ahmed remembers a story in Long Lartin prison:

“Some Australian guy messed around with Sheikh Abu Qatada in the gym, he was saying something about his beard in Long Lartin, he was mocking it, a brother saw it, that evening he had several litres of boiled butter over his head and face and his whole face was melted and he was about to be released as well- that sort of reinforced the hierarchy”

Abu Qatada al-Filistini was held in Belmarsh and Long Lartin prisons on immigration charges.

It is not done with malice just sheer ingenuity. It would have been better if the inmate had been sensible and asked to be put into the segregation unit immediately. The consequences? Ahmed laughs “some get taken to segregation and the rest of us get a few days lock up and privileges get taken away and then life moves on. Nothing changes. Usually there’s little evidence to charge the inmate.” It is no wonder one former disgruntled prison warden told me: “We don’t run the ward the prisoners let us run it”.

If you were a warden than you might get ‘shitted’ on- a technical term referring to a prison warden getting human faeces on their heads, usually the offending turd is disguised in a prison sock and smashed on to his head or put into a bottle and poured on him from above.

On the other hand, if you are a new T-Charge prisoner or just a normal prisoner, nervous about what prison life is like, the emir and the ‘brothers’ get together to cook and host the prisoner for three days to make him feel at ease with his surroundings. An intense loyalty towards the emir and the senior ‘brother’ is built up as a consequence.

Moreover, the T-Charge prisoners are also seen as mediators because they are not involved in the bitter disputes between rival criminal gangs. They are seen as neutral arbitrators and are often brought in to resolve disputes. This again gives them added status and importance amongst inmates. This is not un-similar to the way the young Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi behaved when he was incarcerated in Camp Bucca, Iraq.

When Ahmed was released he was asked if he wanted to become an informer. He was scornful of such a proposition: “you wasted the best years of my life for nothing and now I am going to do you a favour and turn grass?” It just didn’t make sense.

He was unrepentant and it seems that he would have preferred to have been martyred. “You would have saved yourself a whole lot of money and time.” Now he is older and wiser he still watches events in and around the Middle East with interest. His views remain radical perhaps a bit more tempered, and he is still aggrieved by what the British state has done to him. “Even killers told me I shouldn’t be here in the Unit.” Prison, it seems, hasn’t broken him, it hasn’t made him repent, far from it, he is even more confident. Sometimes as the Russian writer Dostoyevsky points out the worst punishment is not the crime itself but living with what you have done. Ahmed lives with it quite well because in his view, he has done nothing wrong. For Ahmed, Syed Qutb’s Milestones which he read at the tender age of fifteen and Malcolm X Autobiography at the age of twenty, both had a profound impact on his life, Belmarsh didn’t remove his grand idea.

I ask Ahmed about the current worry about prison radicalisation. He thinks for a while and replies casually “maybe a stake in society might work for some. Prison will definitely not work for others.” He overheard a T-Charge brother as he was being deported saying “the game isn’t over yet”.

Solutions

After Choudhary and Mizanur Rahman’s conviction, I met up with Ahmed for a coffee not too far from Ladbroke Grove. I asked him about throwing Choudhary into isolation units like the Acheson report has recommended. I asked him whether that would stop radicalisation. He laughs and says:

“It’s not like the US, he’s not going to be like Babar Ahmed! Isolation units have already been done. Long Lartin was like that. We loved it. We kept it clean. Had circles [Islamic study circles], even the screws liked it. No drugs or crime. I see both perspectives but it’s a drain on resources to be honest.”

Bullivant says of the those like Anjem Choudhary:

“I’m sure in theory he could [radicalise], but he’s in solitary because he’s a name, nothing else. Many people inside are better placed to ‘radicalise’. Thing is, there’s as much chance inside that he’d get convinced by brothers to leave his silly ideas. Also there’s the basic injustice of solitary, people need people… so to put him in solitary for no measurable benefit isn’t the right way to go.”

As far as exceptionalising Muslim prisoners, Bullivant added that it fed into this ‘War on Islam’ narrative that Choudhary’s followers feed off. Choudhary will be seen as a martyr for the cause, victimised solely because of his uncompromising stance towards his faith. It sends a message as Bullivant puts it, that the British state “can’t handle the ideas of these people.” In fact, Bullivant’s view is that isolation is the wrong approach:

“I really think that in my time in prison most of the Mojo’s [Muhajiroon] realised they had made errors from being in prison and actually being forced to mix for once. They couldn’t isolate like they do on the outside…no one took Mojo Dawah [proselitisation] seriously, and they ended up all… becoming much more mainstream”

Bullivant seems to be echoing the ideas proposed by a former prison governor, Peter Dawson, who argues that these isolation units will not work. Partly, because they tried it in Northern Ireland and it failed. And partly because with an increase in prison numbers and a reduction in prison staff, it will be unsustainable. Instead Dawson argues that if prison is about punishment and rehabilitation then the best way is to have well funded prisons where well trained and motivated prison staff build long term relationships with inmates of any radical persuasion.