• Fierce fighting leaves over 250 dead in three days
• Syrian and Russian jets carry out strikes in Idlib

BEIRUT: Fighters battling the Syrian army and their Ankara-backed allies reached the country’s second city of Aleppo on Friday, as they pressed a lightning offensive against forces of the Iran- and Russia-backed government.

The fighting is one of the deadliest in five years, with 255 people killed in three days.

Most of the dead have been combatants, but the toll includes 24 civilians, most killed in Russian air strikes.

The offensive began on Wednesday, the same day that a fragile ceasefire took effect in neighbouring Lebanon.

By Friday, the anti-Syrian forces and their allies had wrested control of more than 50 towns and villages in the north, in the Basharul Assad government’s biggest loss of territory in years.

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They then entered western districts of Aleppo, a city of some two million people that was Syria’s pre-war manufacturing hub.

“Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and allied factions… were able to enter the outskirts of the Al-Hamdaniya and New Aleppo neighbourhoods… after carrying out twin suicide attacks with two booby-trapped cars,” according to a television channel.

The HTS, an alliance led by Al Qaeda’s former Syria branch, shelled a student residence in the city, killing four civilians, state media reported.

Syrian and Russian warplanes launched intense air strikes on the enclave around Idlib, where the anti-Syrian fighters are based, carrying out 23 raids.

Army reinforcements have arrived in Aleppo, a Syrian security official said.

An army statement said troops had repelled the assault on the city and retaken some positions.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said “more than 14,000 people — nearly half of them children — have been displaced” by the violence.

Aleppo resident Sarmad, 51, said he could hear “the sounds of missiles and artillery shelling around the clock”.

“We’re scared that war will break out and we’ll be displaced from our homes again,” he said.

Nasser Hamdo, 36, who works in a pastry shop, said he had been glued to the news since hostilities began.

On Thursday, the HTS and its allies cut a highway linking Aleppo to the capital Damascus, some 300 kilometres to the south.

“We’re worried that roads getting blocked could cause fuel prices to soar and prevent goods from reaching the city,” Hamdo said.

International players

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Friday described the situation in Aleppo as “an infringement on the sovereignty of Syria”. He expressed support for “the government of Syria to quickly restore order in this district”.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi pledged “continued support for the government, nation and army of Syria”, in a phone call with his Syrian counterpart Bassam al Sabbagh, according to a statement.

The Idlib area has been subject to a Turkish- and Russian-brokered truce since 2020. The ceasefire has been repeatedly violated but had largely held.

Analyst Nick Heras, of the New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy, said the fighters were “trying to pre-empt the possibility of a Syrian military campaign in the region of Aleppo”.

According to Heras, the Syrian government and its key backer Russia had been preparing for such a campaign.

Russia intervened in Syria in 2015, turning the tide of the civil war which broke out four years earlier in favour of the government, whose forces at the time had lost control of most of the country.

‘Totally unprepared’

Other interests are also at stake. As well as Russia, Syrian President Bashar al Assad has been propped up by Iran and allied groups, including Lebanon’s Hezbollah.

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Iran-backed militias have a heavy presence in the Aleppo region after providing crucial ground support to the army in its recapture of rebel-held areas of the city in 2016.

Heras said anti-government forces are “in a better position to take and seize villages than Russian-backed Syrian government forces, while the Iranians are focused on Lebanon”.

Government forces “were totally unprepared” for the attack“, Rami Abdel Rahman of the Syrian Observatory said.

“It is strange to see regime forces being dealt such big blows despite Russian air cover and early signs that HTS was going to launch this operation,” Abdel Rahman said. “Were they depending on Hezbollah, which is now busy in Lebanon?”

Published in Dawn, November 30th, 2024