Syrian Tribes’ “Big Nay” to Jordan

Representatives of some of the Syria’s prominent pro-government tribes have declined a help offer from the Jordanian king against ISIS, accusing him of supporting “terrorists”.

Jordan’s King Abdullah II “is well aware of who is behind the terrorists and where their operations rooms and military training camps are located, where their funding and weapons come from, and how they enter our country from Jordan,” said Sheikh Mohammed Fares al-Abd al-Rahman of the Tay tribe during a press conference of Syrian tribal leaders in the Syrian capital Damascus on Friday.

Abd al-Rahman, who also chaired the conference, further noted that the Syrian tribes “firmly and definitively reject any call or project to deprive them of their national, Syrian, Arab essence,” and expressed his “surprise” at the king’s offer.

The remarks came days after Jordan’s king promised to support tribes in “eastern Syria and western Iraq,” where Takfiri terrorists are active, calling it Jordan’s duty “as a nation”.

In a statement released by the tribes, Jordan has been urged “to provide real support to Syria against the conspiracy it faces.”
Syria is home to around 20 major tribes, some of them have members in Jordan and Iraq.

Damascus has long accused Jordan of supporting Takfiris against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, particularly by allowing terrorists to cross its border freely.

On May 18, the Syrian Foreign Ministry formally lodged a complaint with the United Nations over Jordan’s persisting involvement in training Syria-bound terrorists on its soil, urging UN action to end Amman’s “public and systematic support… to terrorist groups,” which increases “the suffering of Syria’s citizens because of crimes committed by these groups.”