Wars, Syrian Rebels | featured news

U.S. and allied intelligence have detected Syrian movement of chemical weapons components in recent days, a senior U.S. defense official said Monday, as the Obama administration again warned the Assad regime against using chemical weapons on Syrian rebels.

“They are a legitimate representative of the Syrian people’s aspirations,” the American ambassador to Syria said Thursday. An official announcement of recognition was expected Dec. 12.

Before the civil war, Ramiz Moussa was a middle class civil servant who processed fines for littering, illegal construction and disturbing the peace in Aleppo, Syria's largest city....

In Damascus, two mortar shells struck the upscale neighborhood of Mazzeh during the morning rush hour Thursday.

The United States declined to follow France in fully recognizing a fledgling Syrian opposition coalition on Wednesday, saying the body must prove its worth, after its predecessor was dogged by feuding and accusations of Islamist domination.

France on Tuesday became the first European country to recognize the newly formed Syrian rebel coalition, going beyond other Western pledges of support.

More foreign fighters claiming allegiance to al-Qaida have reportedly joined rebels in war-torn Aleppo, deepening the regional implications of the conflict in Syria. According to Zeina Khodr, a journalist with news channel Al Jazeera, "Arab fighters from Saudi Arabia and Egypt who didn't want to be filmed" were operating in the city. Some reportedly claimed allegiance to al-Qaida.

Syria's government and rebels have "chosen the path of war", a U.N. peacekeeping chief said as the world body ended its doomed monitoring mission to Damascus and deadlock persists among world powers over how to contain the spreading conflict.

Syrian forces have pushed rebels back from a strategic district of Aleppo, but skirmishes continued in the city and the United Nations said the conflict engulfing Syria would have no winner.

Syrian fighter jets fired on rebel positions in the commercial capital of Aleppo on Wednesday, U.N. observers told The Associated Press, a development that could signal a significant escalation in the battle for control of the key city.