Syria's Sectarian Conflict Is Being Fought By Many Different Factions

A Free Syrian Army fighter in the Damascus suburbs. Photograph: Ahmed Jadallah / Reuters/REUTERS

How A Freedom-Fighting Pharmacist Showed Me The Complex Truth About Syria's Sectarian Conflict -- Luke Harding, The Guardian

The grinding 17-month war is being fought by many different factions, but the battle lines are not as clear as many think

It was 5am, and Mohamad Baree was hiding with his fighters behind a large rock. Some 300 metres away, a column of Syrian army tanks was advancing towards Aleppo through the countryside. The group of rebels were waiting for it. Baree watched. He then set off a powerful roadside bomb. It blew two of the tanks up. The others staged a panicky retreat to their base in the northern city of Idlib.

"From a military point of view the operation was successful," Baree tells me a week later, as we bump along in the back of his unit's battle-scarred minivan. Baree, 27, is dressed in khaki fatigues. He carries a Kalashnikov and a pistol. Despite his appearance, he explains that he is actually a pharmacist who has spent seven years living in Odessa; his brother, another fighter in Syria's revolution, a lawyer.

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My Comment: A riveting piece on what is happening on the ground in Syria.