US-backed militants open up new anti-Syria front in northeast
‘Terrorists plotting chemical attacks on Aleppo, Idlib’
Militants from a US-backed, Kurdish-led coalition battled Syrian government forces in northeast Syria early on Tuesday, both sides said, opening a new front for Syrian government which lost parts of Aleppo in a sudden militant advance last week.
Airstrikes also targeted groups supporting Syrian forces in the strategically vital region, a security source in eastern Syria and a Syrian army source said.
The sources both blamed the airstrikes on the US-led military coalition which operates in Syria and has a small detachment of American troops on the ground, Reuters reported.
Foreign-backed Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) terrorist group and allied factions broke through government defense lines in Syria’s second largest city Aleppo on Friday and entered the city’s western neighborhood. The insurgents launched their shock offensive in Aleppo and Idlib countryside on Wednesday and wrested control of dozens of villages and towns along the way, including a strategic town south of Aleppo.
HTS is an alliance led by Al-Qaeda’s former Syria branch, and has faced accusations of human rights abuses.
Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency, citing an informed source, said that terrorists affiliated with the HTS are planning chemical attacks in the northwestern provinces of Aleppo and Idlib amid advances by government forces.
The heaviest fighting on Monday and overnight was along the frontline just north of Hama, another major Syrian city, where several villages have changed hands repeatedly over recent days.
Syrian and Russian warplanes also intensified airstrikes against militants alongside government jets over recent days, both sides have said.
Jockeying for territory
The retreat by Syrian forces over the past several days has led to jockeying for control among other groups that dominate pockets in the northwest, north and east.
The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an umbrella group which controls territory in Syria’s east with US support, said early on Tuesday that its Deir al-Zor Military Council had “become responsible for protecting” seven villages previously held by the Syrian army.
The Deir al-Zor Military Council comprises local Arab fighters under the SDF, an alliance mainly led by a Kurdish militia, the YPG.
Syrian state media reported that the army and allied forces were repelling an SDF assault on the villages, the only Syrian government presence along the east bank of the Euphrates River, an area otherwise mostly held by the SDF.
A return of fighting to northeast Syria, where the United States, Russia, Iran and Turkey are all involved, underscores the messy global politics at play in the conflict and the dangers of escalation in a potentially crowded battlefield.
Iran said late on Monday there would be a foreign ministers meeting with Turkey and Russia in Doha next weekend as part of a diplomatic process used to stabilize borders earlier in the conflict.