Syria Flashcards
Ghuraba al-Sham Front
Ghuraba al-Sham Front (Arabic: جبهة غرباء الشام Jabhat Ghurabā’ ash-Shām, “Strangers/Foreigners of the region of Syria”) is a group of fighters, active during the Syrian civil war, in favor of a non-religious state.[1] The group formerly had around 2,000 men, but in May 2013 it clashed with fundamentalist formations and most of its fighters dispersed.[1] Ghuraba al-Sham’s arsenals were confiscated by the fundamentalists and now it only has around 100 fighters in its ranks.[1] The group consists of a mixture of secularists and Islamists.[1] The name of the group has since changed.[2] There is a battalion within the group called the Loyalty battalion made up entirely of women.[6]
In November 2013, Hasan Jazra, the commander of Ghuraba al-Sham, was publicly executed by members of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant in the Aleppo town of Atareb. Opposition groups had accused Ghuraba of looting and collaborating at times with the Assad regime
Jamal Maarouf
Jamal Maarouf is a Syrian rebel leader active during the Syrian Civil War who was one of the most powerful rebel leaders in northern Syria.[1] during the earlier stages of the conflict. He is the military chief of the Syria Revolutionaries Front and leader of the Syrian Martyrs’ Brigade, both part of the Free Syrian Army.
Before the popular uprising against president Bashar al-Assad, Jamal Maarouf was a construction worker. He had previously served a prison sentence for sexual assault. He was one of the first to take up arms in the Idlib province against the Assad government.[2] He later called for the expulsion of Alawi Muslims across Aleppo province.[1] Jamal Maarouf created the Syrian Martyrs’ Brigade in December 2011 and later the Syria Revolutionaries Front, with funding by Saudi Arabia. The SRF was accused of corruption and of hoarding bread to raise prices in areas under its control, prompting the al-Qaeda affiliated al-Nusra Front to attack it. Maarouf then fled to Turkey after his force was defeated by the al-Nusra Front in late 2014
Staffan de Mistura
Staffan de Mistura (born 25 January 1947) is a long-serving Italian-Swedish diplomat and former member of the Italian government. After a 40-year career in various United Nations agencies,[1] he was appointed Undersecretary of State (Junior Minister) for Foreign Affairs in the Italian cabinet headed by Mario Monti. He is currently the director of Villa San Michele on Capri[2] and United Nations special envoy for the Syria crisis.[3]
De Mistura’s previous UN posts have included that of Special Representative of the Secretary-General in Iraq (2007–2009) and Afghanistan (2010–2011), Personal Representative of the Secretary-General for Southern Lebanon (2001–2004), and Director of the UN Information Center in Rome (2000–2001). His work has taken him to many of the world’s most volatile trouble-spots including Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Rwanda, Somalia, Sudan and the former Yugoslavia.
