US-backed group fights Syrian army as reignited conflict spreads
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Smoke billowing near residential buildings in Aleppo, Syria, on Dec 3.
PHOTO: REUTERS
BEIRUT/AMMAN - Fighters from a US-backed, Kurdish-led coalition battled Syrian government forces in north-eastern Syria early on Dec 4, both sides said, opening a new front for President Bashar al-Assad who lost Aleppo in a sudden rebel advance last week.
Air strikes also targeted Iran-backed militia groups supporting Syrian government forces in the strategically vital region, a security source in eastern Syria and a Syrian army source said.
The sources both blamed the air strikes on the US-led military coalition which operates against Islamic State in Syria and has a small detachment of American troops on the ground. Reuters could not independently confirm the foreign force was involved in the strikes, and the coalition did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment.
The fighting around a cluster of villages across the Euphrates River from regional capital Deir al-Zor complicates the military picture for Mr Assad, whose forces were focused overnight on staunching a renewed rebel assault near Hama.
Last week’s rebel assault that captured Aleppo
Residents of Aleppo said there were already shortages in the city days after its capture. Reuters photographs showed long, chaotic queues for bread.
“There’s no bread. The ovens are closed. The queues are getting longer,” said Mr Mohammed Taha, 35.
Fuel supplies were also restricted and petrol station owner Mohammed Aatro said taxi drivers had hiked their prices in response. “We’re coming to winter and most of the gas stations aren’t working,” he said.
Ahrar al-Sham, a major Islamist faction, said in a video message that the situation would stabilise, and urged fighters to show discipline inside the city.
The heaviest fighting on Dec 2 and 3 was along the front line just north of Hama, another major Syrian city, where several villages have changed hands repeatedly over recent days.
An operations room for the rebel offensive and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war-monitoring group, said on Dec 3 that rebels had again captured those villages. Two opposition sources said the rebels were making gains in the Hama countryside.
Russian warplanes have intensified air strikes against rebels alongside government jets over recent days, both sides have said. Syrian state media reported Syrian and Russian strikes in the northern Hama countryside. Rescue workers reported strikes targeting hospitals in Aleppo and Idlib, causing civilian deaths.
Any sustained escalation in Syria risks further destabilising a region already alight from wars in Gaza and Lebanon, where a truce between Israel and the Hezbollah militant group
The Syrian civil war that began in 2011 killed hundreds of thousands of people, drew in major powers and sent millions of refugees across international borders. Mr Assad has had the upper hand since receiving backing from Russia and Iran a decade ago, but that support has been challenged by devastating losses Israel inflicted on Iran’s Hezbollah allies over the past two months.
Jockeying for territory
The retreat by Mr Assad’s forces over the past several days has led to jockeying for control among other groups that control pockets in the north-west, north and east.
The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an umbrella group which controls territory in Syria’s east with US support, said early on Dec 3 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 led mainly 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, an area otherwise mostly held by the SDF.
A Syrian military officer said the SDF push was aimed at exploiting government forces’ weakness after the rebel advance, and said the army and allied Iran-backed militia groups were sending reinforcements.
Crowded battlefield
A return of fighting to north-eastern Syria, where the US, 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 Dec 2 that there would be a foreign ministers’ meeting with Turkey and Russia in Doha next weekend as part of a diplomatic process used to stabilise borders earlier in the conflict.
The SDF was the main Western-backed ground force in eastern Syria fighting Islamic State, which ran a militant mini-state there from 2014 to 2017. Turkey says the SDF’s main fighting force, the YPG, are Kurdish separatists it regards as terrorists, and sent troops across the frontier in 2017 to push them back.
Rebel advances in recent days have dislodged the YPG from areas it still held in and near Aleppo, including Aleppo’s Sheikh Maqsoud district and a corridor around Tel Refaat to the north.
The SDF presence in north-eastern Syria along much of the border with Iraq also complicates supply lines for Iran-backed regional militia groups supporting Mr Assad. On Dec 2, Reuters reported that hundreds of Iran-backed Iraqi fighters had crossed the border into Syria to help government forces.
Israel has also regularly struck Iran-backed forces in Syria. Syrian state media reported that an Israeli drone had targeted a vehicle near Damascus. Israel’s military said it does not comment on reports in foreign media. REUTERS
