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| Filipino Troops Escape Siege By Al Qaeda in Syria | |
| 2014-09-01 | |
| MANILA, Philippines (AP) �-- Under cover of darkness, 40 Filipino peacekeepers made a daring escape after being surrounded and under fire for seven hours by Syrian rebels in the Golan Heights, Philippine officials said Sunday, leaving 44 Fijian troops still in the hands of the al-Qaida-linked insurgents. "We may call it the greatest escape," Philippine military chief Gen. Gregorio Pio Catapang said. The peacekeepers became trapped after Syrian rebels entered the U.N.-patrolled buffer zone between Syria and Israel this week, seizing 44 Fijian soldiers and demanding that their Filipino colleagues surrender with their weapons. The Filipinos in two U.N. encampments refused and clashed with the rebels on Saturday. The first group of 35 peacekeepers was then successfully escorted out of a U.N. encampment in Breiqa by Irish and Filipino forces on board armored vehicles. The remaining 40 peacekeepers were besieged at the second encampment, called Rwihana, by more than 100 gunmen who rammed the camp's gates with their trucks and fired mortar rounds. The Filipinos returned fire in self-defense, Philippine military officials said. At one point, Syrian government forces fired artillery rounds from a distance to prevent the Filipino peacekeepers from being overwhelmed, said Col. Roberto Ancan, a Philippine military official.
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| Posted by:Ebbomosh Hupemp2664 |
| #5 No such luck for the Fijian soldier-captives. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2014-09-01 22:36 |
| #4 The above assumes our beloved president isn't still holding bullets hostage, of course. Israel might want to see to alternative suppliers before acting... |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2014-09-01 20:54 |
| #3 It seems to me the Israelis could clear the Golan quickly enough when they wanted to. Nobody will fuss over dead Al Qaeda the way they did over innocent Gazans, so they can must shoot everything that moves as long as anyone comes into the kill zone. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2014-09-01 20:51 |
| #2 So now the Muslims hold the Golan Heights that the Israelis withdrew from some years ago in a peace outreach, under the conditions that the UN would keep them from being used to threaten Israel again. I don't suppose the UN will even do so much as issue a harshly worded letter against the Muslim actions though. Gaza has quickly become a side-show to Israeli security. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2014-09-01 09:41 |
| #1 MOAR - via the Aypee The Philippine military chief says a U.N. peacekeeping commander in the Golan Heights should be investigated for allegedly asking Filipino troops to surrender to Syrian rebels who attacked their camp. Gen. Gregorio Pio Catapang said Monday that 40 Filipino peacekeepers defied the U.N. commander's order after being advised by him and instead escaped to safety under cover of darkness from the Golan encampment, which was surrounded by more than 100 insurgents. Forty-five Fijian peacekeepers who surrendered their firearms to the rebels last week are still being held by the al-Qaida-linked insurgents. The United Nations Disengagement Observer Force, which oversees the peacekeeping mission in Golan, did not immediately reply to a request for a comment. |
| Posted by: Frank G 2014-09-01 08:42 |