Jihadists pour into Syrian slaughter | The Sunday Times

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Jihadists pour into Syrian slaughter

An influx of foreign fighters is adding to the carnage that has forced the UN to suspend its peace mission

Hala Jaber in Damascus Published: 17 June 2012

Children being treated at a field hospital in Homs after army shelling Children being treated at a field hospital in Homs after army shelling (Robert King)

HE WAKES at dawn and disguises himself as a peasant to cross the river from Lebanon into Syria. There he joins fellow militants in a “holy” war against President Bashar al-Assad. When night falls, Sheikh Saad Eddine Ghia, 50, creeps back home to north Lebanon after burying his weapon on Syrian soil. He will retrieve it for action the following day.

Jihad is a familiar routine for the sheikh. He fought side by side with Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Iraq, and has no time for the secular rebels of the Free Syrian Army (FSA). “As chaos escalates, the regime will be weakened and so will the FSA,” he said. “In the end, the people will join the jihadists.”

Ghia is one of hundreds of foreign Sunni fighters said to have crossed Syria’s borders to fight the Alawite-dominated regime. Many are extreme Salafist jihadists who combine respect for Islam’s sacred texts

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