History
First units
Before the training program started, about 400 Syrian rebel fighters travelled to the border with Turkey hoping to join the program. Many of them failed to join the program. [5] On May 7, 2015, US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said that nearly 90 fighters had begun their training, and a second group would begin training in the next few weeks. The vetted fighters were being trained to fight the ISIL rather than the Syrian Armed Forces. [6] [7] Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan opened training sites for the program. [8]
On July 12, 2015, 54 fighters from the first graduates of the program, commanded by an ethnic Syrian Turkmen colonel who had defected from the Syrian army, crossed from Turkey to Syria in a convoy of 30 pickup trucks, according to Turkish news media. They would be able to call in US airstrikes against ISIL. [9] Each fighter that graduated was given an M-16 rifle, $400 US dollars, and 400 Turkish liras. [2] On July 28, 2015, leader Nadim al-Hassan and an unspecified number of companions were allegedly abducted by members of the al-Nusra Front while returning from a meeting in Azaz. In a public statement, the group called for their release. [10]
In August 2015, the first group of Division 30 rebels set up a headquarters in Syria, which was attacked and captured by the al-Nusra front, the al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria who kidnapped a number of their members. Later on, following the al-Nusra attack, Assad government warplanes bombed [11] the headquarters causing most remaining members to flee to join other rebel groups. [12]
According to Syrian sources, the 75 fighters newly trained in a camp near the Turkish capital crossed through the Bab al-Salama border crossing and entered the Aleppo Governorate, heading to the town of Tell Rifaat, while others went to support the Mountain Hawks Brigade. The group entered in a convoy of a dozen cars with light weapons and ammunition, under air cover from the US-led coalition. [13]
Second units
In September 2015, a second group of Division 30 rebels, consisting of 75 fighters with 12 Toyota pick-up trucks, medium machine guns and ammunition crossed the Syrian-Turkish border and was stopped and captured by the Levant Front. [14] They ended up giving up much of their weaponry and ammunition to the al-Nusra Front in order to secure passage farther into Syria. [15] [16]
By the end of September 2015, General Lloyd Austin, head of US Central Command, said the remaining members of Division 30 were limited in number, "We're talking four or five". Division 30's current whereabouts are unknown after they allegedly stopped receiving funding and supplies from the U.S. [4]
On 17 November 2015, several members of Division 30 appeared in the announcement video of the Syrian Democratic Forces in the Aleppo and northern Idlib governorates alongside other members of the Army of Revolutionaries and the YPG. [17] However, the Division 30 leadership denied the group as a whole joining the SDF. [18]
In December 2015, some fighters from the "New Syrian Forces" based in Mare' and trained by the US have joined the al-Mu'tasim Brigade, another FSA group in northern Aleppo trained and equipped by the US Department of Defense. [19]
In May 2016, al-Nusra Front released a statement claiming that they have released 7 Division 30 fighters while the commander and the rest of the group are still in custody. [20]
The Free Syrian Army is a big-tent coalition of decentralized resistance militias in the Syrian Civil War founded on 29 July 2011 by Colonel Riad al-Asaad and six officers who defected from the Syrian Armed Forces. The officers announced that the immediate priority of the Free Syrian Army was to safeguard the lives of protestors and civilians from the deadly crackdown by Bashar al-Assad's security apparatus; with the ultimate goal of accomplishing the objectives of the Syrian revolution, namely, the end to the decades-long reign of the ruling al-Assad family. In late 2011, the FSA was the main Syrian military defectors group. Initially a formal military organization at its founding, its original command structure dissipated by 2016, and the FSA identity has since been used by various Syrian opposition groups.
This is a broad timeline of the course of major events of the Syrian civil war. It only includes major territorial changes and attacks and does not include every event.
Al-Nusra Front, also known as Front for the Conquest of the Levant, was a Salafi jihadist organization fighting against Syrian Ba'athist government forces in the Syrian Civil War. Its aim was to overthrow president Bashar al-Assad and establish an Islamic state in Syria.
The inter-rebel conflict during the Syrian Civil War has continued throughout the Syrian Civil War as factions of the Syrian opposition and Free Syrian Army have fought each other, with shifting alliances among various Islamist factions such as Jabhat al Nusra, Ahrar al-Sham, Jaysh al-Islam and the Islamic Front.
The Hazzm Movement was an alliance of Syrian rebel groups affiliated with the Free Syrian Army in northwestern Syria that existed from 25 January 2014 until 1 March 2015, when many of them dissolved into the Levant Front. Some other members joined the Army of Revolutionaries.
Jund al-Aqsa, later known as Liwa al-Aqsa after 7 February 2017, was a Salafist jihadist organization that was active during the Syrian Civil War. Formerly known as Sarayat al-Quds, the group was founded by Abu Abdul 'Aziz al-Qatari as a subunit within the al-Nusra Front. The group later became independent, because al-Nusra was growing too rapidly for its resources and had suffered from fighting the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. On 20 September 2016 the U.S. Department of State designated Jund al-Aqsa as a terrorist organization. The group rejoined al-Nusra Front, by then renamed Jabhat Fateh al-Sham (JFS), in October 2016. However, on 23 January 2017, JFS declared that Jund Al-Aqsa was no longer part of Jabhat Fateh Al-Sham. In early February 2017, some of Jund al-Aqsa's units joined the newly formed Tahrir al-Sham, while the others refused and formed a new splinter group called Liwa al-Aqsa, and captured many towns in northern Hama and southern Idlib from other rebel groups. Following these attacks, Tahrir al-Sham launched a military operation against Liwa al-Aqsa, accusing them of being an ISIL affiliate. Following intense clashes with Tahrir al-Sham, up to 2,100 Liwa al-Aqsa militants left Idlib Province to join ISIL in Raqqa Province, by 22 February 2017.
The following is a timeline of the Syrian civil war from August to December 2014. Information about aggregated casualty counts is found at Casualties of the Syrian Civil War.
The 13th Division was a Syrian rebel group sanctioned by the Syrian National Council. It was among the first armed Syrian opposition groups to receive U.S.-made BGM-71 TOW anti-tank missiles. According to a spokesperson for the FSA's Supreme Military Council, the 13th Division was funded by sources within Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
The al-Nusra Front–SRF/Hazzm Movement conflict started in late October 2014, during the Syrian Civil War, in Idlib and Aleppo governorates, during which al-Nusra attempted to establish an Islamic state rival to that of ISIL. Despite this, the al-Nusra Front and Free Syrian Army factions continued to cooperate in the southern Syrian governorates of Quneitra and Daraa.
The Army of Revolutionaries, also known as Jaysh al-Thuwar, is a multi-ethnic armed Syrian rebel coalition that is allied with the primarily Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) and participating in the Syrian Civil War as part of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
The following is a timeline of the Syrian Civil War from January to July 2015. Information about aggregated casualty counts is found at Casualties of the Syrian Civil War.
The following is a timeline of the Syrian Civil War from January to July 2014. Information about aggregated casualty counts is found at Casualties of the Syrian Civil War.
The Syrian Train and Equip Program is a United States-led military operation launched in 2014 that identified and trained selected Syrian opposition forces inside Syria as well as in Turkey and other US-allied states who would then return to Syria to fight the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. The program reportedly cost the US $500 million. It is a covert program, run by U.S. special operations forces, separate from Timber Sycamore, the parallel covert program run by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). As of July 2015, only a group of 54 trained and equipped fighters had been reported to have been deployed, which was quickly routed by al-Nusra, and a further 75 were reported in September 2015.
The Mu'tasim Division, formerly the Mutasim Brigade, is a Free Syrian Army faction active in the northern Aleppo Governorate, based in the town of Mare'. The group was named after al-Mu'tasim, an Abbasid caliph.
The Northern Division, formerly the Knights of Justice Brigade, is a Free Syrian Army group sanctioned by the Syrian National Council and formerly part of the Syrian Revolutionary Command Council. The group received BGM-71 TOW missiles from the United States and Saudi Arabia, and is also armed, trained, and funded by Qatar.
The following is a timeline of the Syrian Civil War from May to August 2016. Information about aggregated casualty counts is found at Casualties of the Syrian Civil War.
The Raqqa campaign (2012–2013) was a series of battles and offensives launched by various Syrian rebel groups, led by Ahrar al-Sham and the al-Nusra Front, against Syrian government forces in the Raqqa Governorate as part of the Syrian Civil War. The campaign was launched at the second half of 2012 and ended in the capture of the city of Raqqa as well as dozens of smaller towns and facilities.
The Northern Democratic Brigade is a Free Syrian Army unit that is closely allied to the Syrian Kurdish YPG and YPJ in Afrin Region since 2014. Led by Absi Taha, Alexander Khalil, and Alexander Alaa, it also joined the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in November 2015. The initial members of the group originated from Jabal Zawiya in Idlib, and it has recruited Arabs from Idlib, Aleppo, and other cities in northern Syria since allying with the YPG. Since joining the SDF, the unit has begun to operate across much of northern and eastern Syria, participating in operations against anti-SDF Syrian opposition factions, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, the Turkish Armed Forces, and the Syrian National Army.
The Northern Aleppo offensive was a military offensive launched by armed Syrian opposition forces led by the Free Syrian Army against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant in the northern Aleppo Governorate. The offensive resulted in ISIL's withdrawal from the city of Azaz, Menagh Military Airbase, and a number of towns and villages in the area.
Opposition–ISIL conflict during the Syrian Civil War started after fighting erupted between Syrian opposition groups and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). In early January 2014, serious clashes between the groups erupted in the north of the country. Opposition groups near Aleppo attacked ISIL in two areas, Atarib and Anadan, which were both strongholds of the fundamentalist Sunni organization. Despite the conflict between ISIL and other rebels, one faction of ISIL has cooperated with the al-Nusra Front and the Green Battalion to combat Hezbollah in the Battle of Qalamoun. By 2018.
Free Syrian Army 
