Farouq Brigades  The Farouq Brigades (), also spelt Farooq and Farook, was an armed rebel organisation formed by a number of Homs based members of the Free Syrian Army early in the Syrian Civil War. The group rapidly expanded in size and prominence in 2012, before suffering internal splits and battlefield reversals in 2013 that greatly reduced its influence. By 2014, the group was largely defunct, with member factions joining other rebel groups. The brigades were named Farouq after Omar bin al-Khattab, a Sahaba (companion) of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and the second Caliph. The Farouq Brigades emerged from the central city of Homs just months into the Syrian Civil War. Its beginnings are as a subunit of the Khalid ibn al-Walid Brigade, a group of defectors from the Syrian Army that announced its formation in June 2011 and engaged in clashes with members of the Syrian security forces in Homs and Al-Rastan. The group started out with 3,000+ fighters. During the second half of 2011, Farouq was active in Homs, particularly the Baba Amr neighborhood. It was led by a defector, Lieutenant Abdul Razaq Tlass, who was a nephew of the former Syrian Defense Minister Mustafa Tlass. The apparent success of Farouq in holding territory in Baba Amr led to the Syrian government escalating their use of force in an offensive in early 2012, causing heavy casualties amongst the rebels and forcing their retreat into the Homs countryside and the towns of Al-Qusayr and Al-Rastan. In the following months, Farouq absorbed preexisting rebel units and formed new ones across Syria, from Daraa in the south near the Jordanian border to the Farouq al-Shemal (Northern Farouq) which controlled some of the border posts in the north with Turkey. In September 2012, a large number of Islamist rebel brigades, including the Farouq Brigades and the Suquor al-Sham formed the Syrian Islamic Liberation Front, under the leadership of Suquor al-Sham commander Ahmed Abu Issa. Abu Issa claimed the new Front had more than 40,000 fighters, and aimed to establish a state with an "Islamic reference". In May 2013, the BBC gave estimate of 20,000 fighters. In November 2013, the SILF was superseded by a new rebel coalition called the Islamic Front; however, Farouq was not a member of this grouping.