Son of Bin Laden urges ‘jihadist unity’ in Syria

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DUBAI, May 9, (Agencies): The son of al-Qaeda’s late founder Osama bin Laden has urged jihadists in Syria to unite, claiming that the fight in the war-torn country paves the way to “liberating Palestine”. “The Islamic umma (nation) should focus on jihad in Al-Sham (Syria) … and unite the ranks of mujahedeen there,” said 23-year-old Hamza in an audio message posted online. “There is no longer an excuse for those who insist on division and disputes now that the whole world has mobilised against Muslims,” he said.

His undated message comes after al- Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri also urged jihadists in Syria to unite, despite his continued rejection of the rival Islamic State (IS) group and its proclaimed caliphate. “The matter of unity today is one of life and death,” Zawahiri said in an audio message posted online on Saturday. “Either you unite to live as Muslims with dignity, or you bicker and separate and so are eaten one by one,” he added, according to SITE Intelligence monitoring group.

Al-Qaeda’s Syria affiliate Al-Nusra Front is a rival of IS, which is an al- Qaeda offshoot whose leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in 2014 declared an Islamic caliphate across territory seized in Iraq and Syria. Bin Laden’s son said Syria is the “best battlefield” leading to “liberating Al- Quds”, the Arabic name for Jerusalem.

“The road to liberating Palestine is today much shorter compared to before the blessed Syrian revolution,” he said. US intelligence officials have said that Hamza was the favourite son of the 9/11 mastermind who had been grooming him to take over as al-Qaeda’s leader. Meanwhile, Syrian government forces and their allies fought insurgents near Aleppo on Monday and jets carried out raids around a nearby town seized by Islamist rebels, a monitoring group said, despite international efforts to reduce the violence.

The United States and Russia, who support rival sides in Syria’s civil war, said on Monday they would work to revive a February “cessation of hostilities” agreement which reduced fighting in parts of the country for several weeks. But warplanes struck the town of Khan Touman, southwest of Aleppo, the British- based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. Rebels also fought government forces east of Damascus, and jets struck the rebel-held towns of Maarat al- Numan and Idlib.

A recent surge in bloodshed in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city before the war, wrecked the 10-week-old, partial truce sponsored by Washington and Moscow which had allowed UN-brokered peace talks to convene in Geneva.

The talks, attended by government and opposition delegates including representatives from rebel groups, broke up last month with both sides accusing the other of killing the truce. Russia and the United States said in a joint statement they would step up efforts to convince the warring parties to abide by the ceasefire agreement. “We have decided to reconfirm our commitment to the (ceasefire) in Syria and to intensify efforts to ensure its nation- wide implementation,” they said. “We demand that parties cease any indiscriminate attacks on civilians, including civilian infrastructure and medical facilities.”

Russia’s military intervention last September helped President Bashar al- Assad reverse some rebel gains in the west of the country, including in Aleppo province. But insurgents captured the town of Khan Touman last week, inflicting a rare setback on government forces and allied Iranian troops who suffered heavy losses in the fighting.

Several Iranian soldiers were captured in the clashes, a senior Iranian lawmaker said on Monday. Aleppo city is one of the biggest strategic prizes in a war now in its sixth year, and has been divided into government and rebel-held zones through much of the conflict. The Observatory said warplanes struck rebel-held areas of the city early on Monday, and rebels fired shells into government- held neighbourhoods.

Al Manar, the television channel of Damascus’s Lebanese ally Hezbollah, said on Monday troops had destroyed a tank belonging to insurgents and killed some of its occupants. On the eastern edge of Damascus, government forces and their allies shelled rebel-held areas and clashed with insurgents in the area, the Observatory and the rebel force Jaish al-Islam said. Three people were killed and 13 wounded in air strikes on Idlib, it said.

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