---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: barry levine 
Date: Thu, Jan 9, 2014 at 10:07 AM
Subject: re: Syrian Rebels Deal Qaeda-Linked Group a Reversal
To: "letters@nytimes.com"

To the Editor:  

          Those who wrung their hands because the Syrian people deserve a free representative government but we dare no help a movement that's in bed with al-Qaeda get a second chance. The forces Free Syrian Army and al Nusra front have tidily segregated themselves. The opportunity again presents itself to help in the overthrow of al-Assad's illegitimate government without arming al-Qaeda's affiliates. 

Barry Haskell Levine

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/09/world/middleeast/syrian-rebels-said-to-oust-qaeda-linked-group-from-its-aleppo-headquarters.html?_r=0

Syrian Rebels Deal Qaeda-Linked Group a Reversal

By BEN HUBBARDJAN. 8, 2014

The group, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, which is linked to Al Qaeda and known as ISIS, seemed less interested in fighting President Bashar al-Assad than in imposing its ultraconservative version of Islam, antigovernment activists said. It banned smoking, ousted other rebels from their bases, and detained and executed those it decided were opposed to its international jihadist project.BEIRUT, Lebanon — For months, the patchwork of rebel brigades spread across northern Syria watched with foreboding as a new group gradually expanded its control, filling a vacuum left by nearly three years of war.

Last week, mounting tensions between the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and other rebel groups exploded into clashes that have raged across northern Syria, left hundreds dead and further shattered the battle lines in a conflict that is increasingly destabilizing neighboring countries. Rebel fighters have driven the group from a number of areas in recent days, and on Wednesday they ejected it from its headquarters in the major city of Aleppo, dealing the group a sharp reversal

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