By contrast, even before ISIS gained control of eastern Syria, the Syrian regime had largely abandoned the area to focus on the more populated western areas of the country; and it largely left ISIS undisturbed once the group was in power (ISIS’s growth was helpful to Damascus’s efforts to portray the opposition as “terrorists”). For ISIS’s foreign recruits, who often cross into Syria from southern Turkey, Raqqa is also relatively easy to reach. Although coalition strikes and the regime’s recent raids have now made life for its inhabitants more difficult, the city has become a crucial power center in a territory that is now bigger than many countries and includes some 6 million to 8 million people. “There is still the sense that Raqqa is the capital,” said Sarmad Jilani, a Turkey-based Syrian exile and coordinator of “Raqqa is Being Silently Slaughtered,” an activist group that has correspondents in the city.
Posted on: Thu, 11 Dec 2014 09:58:44 +0000
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