Controversial Syrian general killed by Isil landmine
A SENIOR Syrian commander and one of President Bashar al-assad’s most trusted generals has been killed during an operation against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil).
Brig Gen Issam Zahreddine, a field commander in the elite Republican Guard, died after a convoy he was travelling in hit a landmine yesterday morning as they drove through Hawija Saqr near Deir Ezzor province.
Zahreddine, who was in his late 50s, had been leading 7,000 troops in the battle to retake the eastern city of Deir Ezzor from the jihadists.
He also led offensives against armed opposition in the central Homs province and near the capital, Damascus, in the earlier days of the conflict.
His death will be a major blow to the regime, which has lost huge numbers of high-ranking soldiers and generals over the course of the six-year war.
He was a controversial figure who was pictured last year posing next to hanging corpses which appeared to have been cut into pieces.
He is named in a lawsuit filed by the family of Marie Colvin, the late war correspondent who was killed in an artillery attack in Homs in Feb 2012.
The Colvin family alleges that Zahreddine, after learning of The Sunday Times journalist’s whereabouts, ordered a targeted artillery attack on the makeshift opposition media centre where she had been staying.