Very interesting hypothesis about the events in Syria – request for comments

JohnM has just posted an interesting commentary about the current events in Syria which, I think, deserves to be fully quoted.  Here is what he wrote: What I’m thinking is that as part of an Assad/Russia deal with the “non-Islamic rebels” (label is arbitrary and largely inaccurate) is this current battle between generally (this is a VERY fluid and fuzzy dividing line) the foreign fighters versus the local fighters. This