In
November 2013, six fighters in Syria have potentially been identified
as Australians, but with doubts about several of them1.
Three cases, however, are plausible : Roger Abbas Yusuf Topprakaya
and a suicide bomber known as Abu Asma al-Australi. Roger Abbas, who
was killed in October 2012, came from Melbourne and was of Lebanese
origin : it was also a kickboxing champion. He came initially for
humanitarian aid, but he visibly fought then with the al-Nosra front.
Yusuf Topprakaya, who was killed in December 2012, was from the
Turkish community and was monitored by Australian authorities since
2010. He arrived at the Turkish border in mid- 2012, he expects to
enter Syria and joined a local unit of the Farouk Brigades near the
town of Maarat al-Numan. He was noted for his skill in shooting and
bomb making, before being killed by a sniper. In mid-September 2013,
finally, Abu Asma al Australi throws a truck filled with 12 tons of
explosives against a school that serves as billeting for soldiers of
the Syrian regime in the city of al-Mreiya in the province of Deir
es-Zor. The kamikaze attack would have allow al-Nosra to take airbase
in the city. The martyr, from Brisbane and the Lebanese community,
was also monitored by Australian authorities before departure.Other
cases are less documented. In August 2012, a Sydney sheik, Mustapha
al- Mazjoub, was killed in Syria. From Saudi descent, it should be
noted that his brother was the only Australian member of the Syrian
National Council. He died in combat. In November 2012 , a man named
Marwan al- Kassab, regarded as an Australian, died in an explosion in
northern Lebanon while manufacturing bombs for Syrian rebels. In
April 2013, Sammy Salma, from Melbourne, who had traveled with Abbas,
was also killed. In all, an estimated 80 Australians have left in
Syria and 20, perhaps, fought with al- Nosra. Most are from the
Lebanese community, 70% of them were previously known to the
authorities and they came to Syria via Turkey, a little less by
Lebanon. Syria is not the first case out of an Australian contingent.
Between 1998 and 2003, 20 people had joined Afghanistan and the LeT
camps in Pakistan. Between 2002 and 2012, 16 Australians were
arrested in Lebanon, or convicted in absentia for jihadist
activities, mainly related to Ansbat al-Ansar and Fatah al-Islam.
After the invasion of Somalia by Ethiopia in 2006, from 10 to 40
Australians have also joined the Shabaab in Somalia. Australians have
also gone in Yemen in 2010. Conflict in Syria, however, marks a
change of scale. One reason is of course the importance of the
Lebanese community : the conflict in Syria has more impact to its
members than those in Somalia or Yemen. Then, access to Syria via
Turkey is much easier than in previous conflicts. Finally, the
increasingly sectarian character of the conflict and the inability of
the Western community to curb it clearly have been a breath of fresh
air for groups like al-Nosra or ISIS .
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| Roger Abbas.-Source : http://resources3.news.com.au/images/2012/10/31/1226506/977691-roger-abbas.jpg |
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| Yusuf Topprakaya.-Source : http://resources1.news.com.au/images/2013/01/02/1226546/770837-yusuf-toprakkaya.jpg |
 |
| Au centre, le Sheikh de Sydney, Mustapha al-Mazjoub.-Source : http://images.smh.com.au/2013/12/06/4987836/art-353-abindingfervour4-300x0.jpg |
The
fight is also implemented in Australia. Since early 2012, 17
incidents were identified as being related to the Syrian conflict,
mainly Sunni attacks against persons, property or shops of Shiites or
Alawites. They occur mostly in Sydney and Melbourne and involve
people from Syrian, Turkish and Lebanese communities. Australia has
experienced several preparations of terrorist attacks thwarted before
execution, against the Sydney Olympics in 2000, one from LeT in 2003,
and two autonomous cells dismantled in Sydney and Melbourne in 2005,
which included individuals trained in Afghanistan and Pakistan. A
planned attack against the Army Barracks in 2009 Hollsworthy again
stopped in time, involved men who participated in the financing
network and recruitment for the Shabaab. Note however that sectarian
incidents declined in 2013.
In
December 2013 , two men were arrested in Sydney. Police say one of
two men, Hadmi Alqudsi, was a recruiter for al-Nosra and probably for
ISIS ( he would have sent at least six people in Syria). The second
man arrested was about to leave. For Andrew Zammit, the specialist of
the question, this means that the routing networks in Australia are
getting more organized2.
December 8, moreover, the authorities announced that they have
confiscated 20 passports for fear of departures to Syria, bringing
the total so far to 90 in all. In January 2014 , after the outbreak
of fighting against ISIS, Yusuf Ali, an Australian, and his wife were
killed in Aleppo. Tyler Casey came into Syria between June and August
with the help of Alqudsi arrested in December 2013 in Sydney. He
fought in the al-Nosra front. Born in the United States, Yusuf has
gone then to Australia with his parents and was raised as a
Christian. When his parents separated when he was 13, he has gone in
the United States with his mother. He returns to Australia at 17 and
converts to Islam. In November 2011 , he married Amira Ali in Sydney,
which is dead with him in Syria. Yusuf is the 7th Australian we are
sure that he has been killed on site3.
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| Yusuf Ali.-Source : http://www.brisbanediary.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Yusuf-Ali-Al-Qaeda-Link.jpg |
Below, the preacherMusaCerantonio, which supportsal-Nosraherein early 2013, has sincetaken up the causefor ISIS.
The
dispute between ISIS and al-Nosra, which started in April 2013, which
degenerated into armed confrontation between ISIS and other rebel
groups from January 2014, is not without effect on the landscape of
Australian volunteers. In February, Zawahiri, the leader of al-Qaeda,
publicly disavow ISIS and confirms its support for al-Nosra, as
fighting has already started last month. Abu Sulayman, former
preacher of Sydney linked to al-Nosra, comes on March, 17th,
to announce that he mediates between the two camps, and then makes
public commitment, through videos and speeches, to defend Zawahiri
and al-Nosra against ISIS. But al- Nosra supporters are not alone in
Australia : Cerantonio Musa, another former preacher of Melbourne,
took up the cause for EIIL. The last Australians killed in Syria
rather belong to EIIL, but the information is too sparse to say that
this group would have taken precedence over others in the recruitment
from Australia4.
The Meir Amit Israeli center considers, in February 2014, that
several dozen to a hundred Australians are in Syria ; according to
intelligence, they might even be several hundreds of Australians,
including a hundred just for al-Nosra. The Lebanese community is
still a center for recruitment, including through family ties with
northern Lebanon and Tripoli area that would facilitate border
crossing with Syria5.
April 24, 2014, there is a total of 10 Australians that we are sure
they perished in Syria6.
1Andrew
Zammit, « Tracking Australian Foreign Fighters in Syria »,
CTC Sentinel, Volume 6 Issue 11-12, novembre 2013, p.5-9.
4Andrew
Zammit, « Syria: a fractured opposition and Australian
consequences », The Strategist/The Australian Strategic
Policy Institute Blog, 24 avril 2014.
5Foreign
fighters from Western countries in the ranks of the rebel
organizations affiliated with Al-Qaeda and the global jihad in
Syria, The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information
Center, 3 février 2014.