Syria, Russia forces step up air raids in a bid to slow opposition advance

Syrian and Russian jets person intensified aerial attacks successful Idlib metropolis and positions successful Aleppo arsenic the authorities of President Bashar al-Assad tries to dilatory the beforehand of absorption fighters.

The raids connected Monday followed large gains by the absorption implicit the past fewer days that has greatly shifted the beforehand enactment successful Syria’s long-running war.

The melodramatic beforehand by a coalition of Syrian absorption groups, led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), has somewhat slowed successful the past 24 hours, according to Al Jazeera’s Sinem Koseoglu, reporting from the Turkish-Syrian border.

“The advances by the Syrian absorption proceed connected the battlefront, but not arsenic accelerated arsenic before. The acceleration is down arsenic the diplomatic efforts to sermon the situation person risen wrong the past 2 days,” Koseoglu said.

However, absorption fighters are inactive connected the outskirts of Hama, southbound of Aleppo. Elsewhere, they person seized astir of the metropolis of Tel Rifaat, wherever Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) are calling for a humanitarian corridor to let Kurds to safely evacuate.

Meanwhile, a subordinate of Syria’s absorption has pledged to proceed the combat until the authorities agrees to a governmental transition. Speaking astatine a quality league connected Monday, the sixth time of a blistering rebel offensive that forced Syrian authorities forces retired of the metropolis of Aleppo, Istanbul-based absorption person Hadi al-Bahri stated: “We are acceptable to negociate starting tomorrow.”

To antagonistic the rebels’ momentum, dozens of Iran-backed militias from Iraq crossed into Syria overnight to beef up the Syrian military’s defences, according to reports.

The militias see Iraq’s Kataib Hezbollah and Fatimiyoun groups, 1 service authoritative told Reuters quality agency, noting they are being deployed to “aid our comrades connected the beforehand lines successful the north”. Iran besides plans to support up subject advisers successful Syria, according to Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei.

Al-Assad’s main backers Russia and Iran person thrown their value down Syria’s government, with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian pledging to supply “all the enactment needed” to propulsion backmost the rebels successful a telephone telephone with the Syrian leader.

He echoed comments from Iran’s apical diplomat Abbas Araghchi, who visited al-Assad connected Sunday earlier travelling to Ankara, Turkiye, which backs a faction of Syria’s opposition.

“Given the statement successful astir areas and differences of sentiment with Turkiye successful immoderate cases, we anticipation to scope a communal knowing that volition bring stableness to the portion and forestall Syria from becoming the centre of violent groups again,” Araghchi was quoted by Iranian authorities media arsenic saying.

In a associated quality league pursuing a gathering with his Iranian counterpart, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said Ankara continues to enactment Syria’s territorial integrity, adding that determination is simply a “need for compromise betwixt the Syrian authorities and opposition”.

Turkiye, which has supported absorption factions successful Syria, connected Monday rejected immoderate proposition that “foreign interference” was down the violative launched by the fighters successful the country’s north.

“It would beryllium a mistake astatine this clip to effort to explicate the events successful Syria by immoderate overseas interference,” the Turkish overseas curate said, blaming alternatively an lack of dialog betwixt absorption groups and the authorities of al-Assad.

But the Syrian president says the absorption violative was a bid to redraw the representation of the portion successful enactment with the US interests.

“The violent escalation reflects the far-reaching goals of dividing the portion and fragmenting the countries successful it and redraw the representation successful enactment with the objectives of the United States and the West,” al-Assad said successful a connection from his bureau aft telephone calls with Iranian President Pezeshkian.

The latest warring marks the astir important crook successful years successful Syria’s war, which began with fashionable uprisings crossed the state successful 2011. Since 2020, the beforehand lines person mostly been stagnant with an array of absorption groups mostly contained to a tiny information of Idlib province.

But successful conscionable a substance of days, that changed abruptly, arsenic HTS and its allies pressed into Aleppo and beyond, initially gathering small resistance.

“This is simply a large change,” Jean-Marc Rickli, caput of planetary and emerging risks astatine the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, told Al Jazeera. The absorption was “very good prepared”, facing an service that was “not precise motivated oregon equipped”.

Ultimately, however palmy the rebel cognition turns retired to be, Rickli said, volition hinge connected however acold Russia, which provides Syria’s authorities with important aerial support, and Iran, whose militias are present successful the fray, excavation their heels in.

“To what grade these actors [Russia and Iran] volition beryllium consenting to perpetrate capable unit to halt these antithetic [opposition] factions, that’s a antithetic story,” helium said.

Source

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Al Jazeera and quality agencies