A senior Syrian military source reported major rifts among armed groups fighting President Bashar al-Assad government, adding that 85% of the terrorists fighting in Syria are foreign nationals coming from other Arab states.

"The Syrian Army is fighting groups 80% to 85% of which are formed of foreign nationals coming from different Arab countries," the source told al-Ajel news website on Monday.

He revealed that al-Qaeda forces are also among the members of the armed groups fighting against the Syrian people.

The military source also referred to the widening gaps among the members of these armed groups, and said some of them have defected from their relevant groups and formed new gangs.

In relevant remarks yesterday, a French surgeon who treated terrorists in Aleppo said that half of the rebels in Syria are from foreign countries recruited by a number of foreign countries, and that most of his patients in Syria were wounded militants and not civilians.

Speaking upon return from two weeks in Aleppo, Jacques Beres, co-founder of medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) told Reuters that contrary to his previous visits to Homs and Idlib earlier this year about 60 percent of those he had treated this time had been rebel terrorists, and not civilians, and that at least half of them had been non-Syrian.

The foreign terrorists included young Frenchmen who said they were inspired by Mohammed Merah, a self-style militant from Toulouse, who killed seven people in March in the name of al-Qaeda. The seven people included three soldiers from North African immigrant families, a rabbi and three Jewish children.

Assad himself has consistently maintained that the 17-month-old insurgency against him is largely the work of "foreign-backed terrorists" and says his forces are acting to restore stability.

Syria has been experiencing unrest since March 2011 with organized attacks by well-armed gangs against Syrian police forces and border guards being reported across the country.

Hundreds of people, including members of the security forces, have been killed, when some protest rallies turned into armed clashes.

The government blames outlaws, saboteurs, and armed terrorist groups for the deaths, stressing that the unrest is being orchestrated from abroad.

In October 2011, calm was eventually restored in the Arab state after President Assad started a reform initiative in the country, but Israel, the US and its Arab allies are seeking hard to bring the country into chaos through any possible means. Tel Aviv, Washington and some Arab capitals have been staging various plots in the hope of increasing unrest in Syria.