A newly formed army has joined other Syrian rebels who are fighting the powerful Al-Qaeda affiliated Islamic State of Iraq and the Greater Syria (ISIS).
The Mujahedeen Army has declared war on ISIS and joined other opposition groups in battling the extremists.
Syria’s main opposition Syrian National Coalition says it backs the rebel fight against Al-Qaeda.
“We, the army of the Mujahedeen, pledge to defend ourselves and our honor, wealth and lands, and to fight ISIL, which has violated the rule of God, until it announces its dissolution,” said the new alliance of eight groups, in a statement published on Facebook Friday.
The Islamic Front, the largest rebel alliance, which is made up of several powerful Islamist groups, and the Syrian Revolutionaries Front, another major rebel bloc, also battled ISIS on Friday, Agence France-Presse reported.
“The Coalition stands in full solidarity with all Syrians rising up against Al-Qaeda’s extremism and calls upon the international community to recognize the importance of supporting revolutionary forces as partners in the fight against Al-Qaeda’s extremism and Assad’s sponsorship and encouragement of extremist forces,” the Coalition said in a statement.
The Mujahedeen army demanded that ISIS fighters join the ranks of other rebel groups “or hand over their weapons and leave Syria,” it said on Saturday.
The alliance reproached ISIS for “spreading strife and insecurity… in liberated [rebel] areas, spilling the blood of fighters and wrongly accusing them of heresy, and expelling them and their families from areas they have paid heavily to free themselves from Assad’s forces.”
......
