MESOP NEWS : Deir e-Zor executions highlight underlying divisions within IS ranks

The Islamic State (IS) executed three young men in a town in the western countryside of Deir e-Zor for “smuggling goods into blockaded regime-controlled areas” of the provincial capital, a member of the Syrian Revolution Coordination Union told Syria Direct Thursday.

“The three were quickly executed on Wednesday by firing squad,” said Abdullah Abu Zaid, adding that IS at the time also held 13 other individuals on similar charges, but it was not immediately clear whether they were also executed. The executions come after the IS governor of Deir e-Zor, Abu Salah al-Jablawi, issued a decree Sunday ordering the expulsion of all residents of the province’s western countryside within 48 hours based on reports that some were smuggling food and supplies into the regime’s two encircled districts in Deir e-Zor city, said Muhammad Hasan, a correspondent with pro-opposition Sound and Picture, to Syria Direct Tuesday. The decree ignited tense confrontations between local IS members who opposed it and foreign IS partisans who supported it, triggering a revised decision by the governor ordering the expulsion of populations from only four western villages. The Islamic State removed al-Jablawi from office on Monday, Hasan told Syria Direct Thursday, adding that the “primary reason” for his dismissal was the intra-IS conflict. IS replaced al-Jablawi with the previous head of the Hisbeh, or the Islamic police, Abu Adnan a-Shami, reported pro-opposition Al-Hal A-Suri on Wednesday.