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Iran-Backed Iraqi Militias Enter Syria to Reinforce Government Forces
People walk past damaged site in Aleppo, after Syrian army said dozens of its soldiers had been killed in major attack by rebels who swept into city, in Syria, Nov. 30, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Hassano
Hundreds of fighters from Iran-backed Iraqi militias crossed into Syria overnight to help the government fight rebels who seized Aleppo last week, Syrian and Iraqi sources said on Monday, and Tehran pledged to aid the Damascus government.
At least 300 fighters, primarily from the Badr and Nujabaa groups, crossed late on Sunday using a dirt road to avoid the official border crossing, two Iraqi security sources said.
“These are fresh reinforcements being sent to aid our comrades on the front lines in the north,” a senior Syrian military source said, adding the fighters had crossed in small groups to avoid airstrikes.
Iran’s constellation of allied regional militia groups has long been integral to the success of pro-government forces in subduing rebels who rose up against President Bashar al-Assad in 2011, and they have long maintained bases in Syria.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said on Monday Syria‘s military was capable of confronting the rebels but, referring to the regional militia groups Tehran backs, he added that “resistance groups will help and Iran will provide any support needed.”
Syrian government and Russian warplanes intensified attacks on Monday in areas held by rebels in the northwest, residents and rescue workers said, including a strike on a displaced people’s camp that killed seven.
The lightning rebel assault last week caught many in the region unaware, dealing Assad his biggest blow in years and reigniting a conflict that had appeared frozen for years after civil war front lines stabilized in 2020.
Although Russia has been focused on the war in Ukraine since 2022, it retains an air base in northern Syria. The main Iran-backed terrorist group, Lebanon’s Hezbollah, has been focused on its own war with Israel since the Gaza conflict began last year.
The US and United Arab Emirates have discussed the possibility of trying to peel Assad away from Iran by offering to lift sanctions if he cuts off weapons routes to Lebanon’s Hezbollah, according to sources familiar with the matter.
The discussions took place before the rebel advance on Aleppo last week, the sources said.
Syria‘s conflict erupted in a rebellion against Assad’s rule in 2011 and the rebels held much of Aleppo from 2012 until 2016, when government forces retook it with help from Russia and Iran-backed militias in a major turning point of the war.
Any prolonged escalation in Syria risks further destabilizing a region already roiled by the conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon, with millions of Syrians already displaced and with regional and global powers backing rival forces in the country.
The rebels include mainstream groups backed by Turkey, as well as the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham which was formerly affiliated with al-Qaeda. Turkey also has a military presence in a strip of Syrian territory along its border.
Kurdish-led forces that Ankara calls terrorists, but which fought Islamic State militants with US help, hold territory in the northeast.
The Turkish and Iranian foreign ministers met on Monday and discussed the fighting in Syria. Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said rebel advances could not be explained by foreign intervention and urged the Syrian opposition to compromise.
AIRSTRIKES
Russia, whose 2015 entry into the conflict turned the military balance decisively in Assad’s favor continues to support the Syrian president and is analyzing the situation on the ground, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said.
On Sunday Moscow dismissed the general in charge of its forces in Syria, Russian war bloggers reported.
The Syrian government said Syrian and Russian air forces were striking rebel-held positions in the countryside east of Aleppo city.
The White Helmets rescue organization and residents of rebel-held areas in the north said warplanes had hit residential areas of Aleppo city and a displaced people’s camp in Idlib province where seven people were killed, including five children.
The government said the military was working to secure a string of towns it recaptured from rebels on Sunday that run along the front line north of Hama, a city lying between Aleppo and the capital Damascus.
In Turkey, Syrian opposition leader Hadi al-Bahra said the rebels sought to force the Syrian government to accept a political transition. “We are ready to start negotiating tomorrow,” Bahra told a press conference.
Turkey’s state-owned Anadolu news agency said the Turkey-backed Syrian National Army had taken the town of Tel Rifaat from the Kurdish YPG militia and was continuing to advance in outer areas of the district.
Rebel sources and an Aleppo resident said the Kurdish YPG group was pulling out of the city’s Sheikh Maqsoud district under a deal with rebel forces. The YPG had long held Sheikh Maqsoud.
The post Iran-Backed Iraqi Militias Enter Syria to Reinforce Government Forces first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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North London Synagogue, Nursery Targeted in Eighth Local Antisemitic Incident in Just Over a Week
Demonstrators against antisemitism in London on Sept. 8, 2025. Photo: Campaign Against Antisemitism
A synagogue and its nursery school in the Golders Green area of north London were targeted in an antisemitic attack on Thursday morning — the eighth such incident locally in just over a week amid a shocking surge of anti-Jewish hate crimes in the area.
The synagogue and Jewish nursery were smeared with excrement in an antisemitic outrage echoing a series of recent incidents targeting the local Jewish community.
“The desecration of another local synagogue and a children’s nursery with excrement is a vile, deliberate, and premeditated act of antisemitism,” Shomrim North West London, a Jewish organization that monitors antisemitism and also serves as a neighborhood watch group, said in a statement.
“This marks the eighth antisemitic incident locally in just over a week, to directly target the local Jewish community,” the statement read. “These repeated attacks have left our community anxious, hurt, and increasingly worried.”
Local law enforcement confirmed they are reviewing CCTV footage and collecting evidence to identify the suspect and bring them to justice.
This latest anti-Jewish hate crime came just days after tens of thousands of people marched through London in a demonstration against antisemitism, amid rising levels of antisemitic incidents across the United Kingdom since the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
In just over a week, seven Jewish premises in Barnet, the borough in which Golders Green is located, have been targeted in separate antisemitic incidents.
According to the Metropolitan Police, an investigation has been launched into the targeted attacks, all of which involved the use of bodily fluids.
During the incidents, a substance was smeared on four synagogues and a private residence, while a liquid was thrown at a school and over a car in two other attacks.
As the investigation continues, local police said they believe the same suspect is likely responsible for all seven offenses, which are being treated as religiously motivated criminal damage.
No arrests have been made so far, but law enforcement said it is actively engaging with the local Jewish community to provide reassurance and support.
The Community Security Trust (CST), a nonprofit charity that advises Britain’s Jewish community on security matters, condemned the recent wave of attacks and called on authorities to take immediate action.
“The extreme defilement of several Jewish locations in and around Golders Green is utterly abhorrent and deeply distressing,” CST said in a statement.
“CST is working closely with police and communal partners to support victims and help identify and apprehend the perpetrator,” it continued.
The Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) also denounced the attacks, calling for urgent measures to protect the Jewish community.
“These repeated incidents are leaving British Jews anxious and vulnerable in their own neighborhoods, not to mention disgusted,” CAA said in a statement.
Since the start of the war in Gaza, the United Kingdom has experienced a surge in antisemitic crimes and anti-Israel sentiment.
Last month, CST published a report showing there were 1,521 antisemitic incidents in the UK from January to June of this year. It marks the second-highest total of incidents ever recorded by CST in the first six months of any year, following the first half of 2024 in which 2,019 antisemitic incidents were recorded.
In total last year, CST recorded 3,528 antisemitic incidents for 2024, the country’s second worst year for antisemitism despite being an 18 percent drop from 2023’s record of 4,296.
In previous years, the numbers were significantly lower, with 1,662 incidents in 2022 and 2,261 hate crimes in 2021.
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Germany to Hold Off on Recognizing Palestinian State but Will Back UN Resolution for Two-State Solution
German national flag flutters on top of the Reichstag building, that seats the Germany’s lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, in Berlin, Germany, March 25, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Lisi Niesner
Germany will support a United Nations resolution for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict but does not believe the time has come to recognize a Palestinian state, a government spokesman told Reuters on Thursday.
“Germany will support such a resolution which simply describes the status quo in international law,” the spokesman said, adding that Berlin “has always advocated a two-state solution and is asking for that all the time.”
“The chancellor just mentioned two days ago again that Germany does not see that the time has come for the recognition of the Palestinian state,” the spokesman added.
Britain, France, Canada, Australia, and Belgium have all said they will recognize a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly later this month, although London said it could hold back if Israel were to take steps to ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and commit to a long-term peace process.
The United States strongly opposes any move by its European allies to recognize Palestinian independence.
Last week, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that the US has told other countries that recognition of a Palestinian state will cause more problems.
Those who see recognition as a largely symbolic gesture point to the negligible presence on the ground and limited influence in the conflict of countries such as China, India, Russia, and many Arab states that have recognized Palestinian independence for decades.
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UN Security Council, With US Support, Condemns Strikes on Qatar
Qatar’s Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani attends an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council, following an Israeli attack on Hamas leaders in Doha, Qatar, at UN headquarters in New York City, US, Sept. 11, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz
The United Nations Security Council on Thursday condemned recent strikes on Qatar’s capital Doha, but did not mention Israel in the statement agreed to by all 15 members, including Israel‘s ally the United States.
Israel attempted to kill the political leaders of Hamas with the attack on Tuesday, escalating its military action in what the United States described as a unilateral attack that does not advance US and Israeli interests.
The United States traditionally shields its ally Israel at the United Nations. US backing for the Security Council statement, which could only be approved by consensus, reflects President Donald Trump’s unhappiness with the attack ordered by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“Council members underscored the importance of de-escalation and expressed their solidarity with Qatar. They underlined their support for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Qatar,” read the statement, drafted by Britain and France.
The Doha operation was especially sensitive because Qatar has been hosting and mediating negotiations aimed at securing a ceasefire in the Gaza war.
“Council members underscored that releasing the hostages, including those killed by Hamas, and ending the war and suffering in Gaza must remain our top priority,” the Security Council statement read.
The Security Council will meet later on Thursday to discuss the Israeli attack at a meeting due to be attended by Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani.