Special to WorldTribune.com

NICOSIA — The Islamic State of Iraq and Levant has intensified
attacks on Syrian rebels amid the offensive by the regime of President
Bashar Assad.

Opposition sources said ISIL, which broke from Al Qaida, expanded
operations against Sunni rebels amid the Syrian Army offensive in the north.

They said ISIL was killing hundreds of rebels every week and diverting them
from operations against the regime.

“ISIL attacks have increased and seek to drive out the opposition from
the last areas in the north,” a source said.

The sources said ISIL attacks were killing more rebels than the Assad
regime. They said ISIL has focused operations in the eastern oil-rich
province of Dir Al Zour, deemed a corridor to Iraq. ISIL was said to have
deployed 2,000 fighters against 10,000 by rival militias in Dir Al Zour.

Al Qaida leader Ayman Zawahiri has urged ISIL to stop attacks on other
Al Qaida-aligned rebels in Syria. Zawahiri said ISIL must return to Iraq and
fight the Shi’ite-led government in Iraq.

“About your demand for us to withdraw from Syria, this will not happen
and we repeat that this order is impossible,” ISIL spokesman Abu Mohammed Al
Adnani said on May 11.

The sources said the ISIL leadership was working with both Iranian and
Syrian intelligence. They said the Islamist network, responsible for killing
thousands of rebels in 2014, refrained from conducting any major operations
against Assad’s military or militias.

As a result, the Syrian military was said to have granted virtual
immunity to ISIL. The sources said ISIL maintains a huge headquarters in
Aleppo that has been spared the daily strikes by the Syrian Air Force.

“The proof of ISIL complicity with Assad is right there in Aleppo,” the
source said. “But you can see it also in Dir Al Zour, where the Syrian Air
Force attacks our positions during ISIL raids.”

In June 2014, Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported Syrian Air
Force strikes on ISIL positions near the Syrian border with Iraq. But
opposition sources said the attacks appeared to mark a one-time event.

At the same time, Syrian Observatory also reported pitched battles
between ISIL and Al Qaida’s Nusra Front for the Defense of the Levant, a
group supported by Zawahiri. Syrian Observatory said hundreds of people were
killed, including members of the Free Syrian Army, in Dir Al Zour since May
1.

“If you do not send us ammunition, anti-tank weapons, the situation will
get worse because of the superiority of the ISIL eqiupment,” a rebel
commander, identified as Mohammed Talaa, said.

  Ayman Zawahiri, Dir Al Zour, ISIL said to have killed more rebels in Syria than Assad’s forces, Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, Syrian Observatory for Human Rights