LOS ANGELES, March 5 (UPI) -- A video posted online shows two men who say they are Los Angeles gangbangers fighting the "enemigos" of President Bashar Assad in Syria.
One calls himself "Wino" and says he is a member of the Westside Armenian Power gang, the Los Angeles Times reports. Glendale, Calif., police say he is Nersis Kilajian, 31, a Syrian national deported in 2012.
The other, "Creeper," says he is from the Sun Valley GW-13, a Los Angeles gang with links to Mexican criminal groups. He remains unidentified.
"Wino" has been described as an Armenian Christian, a group that feels under threat from radical Islamists who have joined the rebel side in Syria.
One friend's comment on his Facebook page, like the video, mixes Los Angeles rhetoric with Syrian politics: "the turkish sluaghterer. proud to have you protect our people dawg, its people like you gonna be written about in our history books to come. modern day fedayi homies."
On the video, the two men fire weapons -- without aiming them -- in what they say is the direction of the regime's "enemigos."
The Times said the video is the first suggestion that people from the United States are fighting on the government side in Syria, although intelligence officials say about 50 are believed to have joined the anti-Assad rebels.
