Syria's Ordeal

"Westerners already don't like the revolution because they think we will not keep the peace with Israel like [President Bashar] Assad has done. If people think we are all al-Qaeda, then no one will support us."
Walid Awaji, Aleppo pharmacist

Jabhat al-Nusra, the al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorist group that has helped the Free Syrian Army turn the tide - or at least hold their own - against the Alawite regime of the Shia minority, is not wildly popular with ordinary civilian Sunni Syrians, nor, in all likelihood, with most Syrian rebel militias. Who, despite their distaste for the presence of the terrorists still may acknowledge their success in battling the regime's military.

Where the various Syrian Sunni militias that make up the Free Syrian Army have been unco-ordinated and disinterested in forming a cohesive and well organized whole, the firm discipline and fierce fighting ability of the terrorists have made the difference in the rebels being able to hold their own against the better-organized and -equipped regime forces.

Some of the Free Syrian Army units have not been averse to committing atrocities in competition with the violently vicious excesses attributed to the regime. The Syrian revolution would have faltered completely due to the lack of skill, organization and equipment, had it not been for the intervention of various Islamist groups allying themselves behind the rebels.

The unforgiving violence of the terror groups has foisted additional suffering on the civilian population caught between the aerial attacks of the regime and the cross-fire of the rebels. The tens of thousands who have migrated desperately across the border into Jordan, Turkey and Lebanon, the millions internally displaced and desperate for a cessation of the hell their lives have been plunged into see no solution in their misery for the near future.

The secular rebel groups have been falling apart. Accused of civilian abuses, and disrupted with in-fighting among themselves, they are largely ineffective and demoralized. The jihadists who were originally in the background awaiting their opportunity are now in the forefront, utilizing those opportunities.

 Jabhat al-Nusra fighters are now planning to make a key base out of Syria's second-largest city, Aleppo.

"We don't want them here. We don't want them in our revolution. These people don't help our cause", complained Ahmad Fartawi, angry that the group is claiming credit for liberating bases and taking towns. His claim is that it is the secular Free Syrian Army that is really responsible for the opposition gains.

At the same time that Syrians are grumbling at the presence of Jabhat al-Nusra, they are increasing their anti-Western hostility, initiated by the lack of response to their pleas for help, mostly their need for weapons to enable them to counter the better-equipped regime forces.

"The Jews who support Assad don't want us to overthrow him. They know Assad has been protecting Israel. So they tell [President Barack] Obama that the rebels are al-Qaeda", claims truck driver 52-year-old Hamid Shufi.