Syrian jihadists and their allies have captured some 50 towns in a sweeping offensive in northwestern Syria, closing in on the major city of Aleppo and killing at least 240 people, humanitarian organizations said today.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported a "meteoric advance" by rebels who have launched an attack on government forces, striking some 50 towns.
These are the most violent clashes since 2020 in northwestern Syria, where Aleppo province, largely controlled by Bashar al-Assad's regime, borders the last major rebel and jihadist stronghold of Idlib.
A Syrian regime official said the army had "sent reinforcements" to Aleppo, but assured that the attackers "did not reach the city limits."
The Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group -- the Organization for the Liberation of the Levant, also known as al-Qaeda in Syria -- and allied groups, some close to Turkey, began their offensive on Wednesday night, but the main fighting took place today, with the approach to Aleppo having been made this morning.
According to the OSDH, based in the United Kingdom but with a vast network of sources in Syria, 24 civilians were killed on Friday, including 19 in strikes by Russian planes, allied with the regime, in rebel areas.
"They are less than two kilometers from the city of Aleppo," said OSDH director Rami Abdel Rahmane, in statements to the French news agency AFP.
The city, Syria's second largest, was bombed for the first time in four years, targeting the university campus, where four civilians were killed, according to the Syrian news agency Sana.
"It is strange to see the regime forces taking such blows despite Russian air cover (...) The regime forces were dependent on [the Lebanese Shiite group] Hezbollah, which is currently occupied in Lebanon," argued Rami Abdel Rahmane, referring to the recent war between Israel and the Lebanese movement, an ally of Damascus.
Iran is another strong ally of Syria, a country in which Tehran has become militarily involved, sending advisers, at the request of the local authorities, to support President Assad during the Syrian civil war.
Thanks to this war, which began in 2011, HTS, dominated by the former Syrian branch of al-Qaeda, took control of entire sectors of Idleb province, but also of neighbouring territories in the regions of Aleppo, Hama and Latakia.
The jihadists and their allies cut off the vital road linking the capital Damascus to Aleppo on Thursday, according to the OSDH, and took control of the road junction between Aleppo and the coastal city of Latakia.
The Syrian civil war began in 2011, following the Arab Spring protests that provoked a violent response from the government of Bashar al-Assad.
The protests in Syria against Bashar al-Assad - who has led the country since 2000, following in the footsteps of his family, in power since 1970 - have spread to neighboring Arab countries and mobilized resources from countries such as the United States and Russia.
While the war initially aimed to overthrow the government and establish a democratic government, over time the focus has changed radically.
The opposition, represented by the Free Syrian Army (FSA), has embraced religious fundamentalist ideals and joined forces with other extremist groups.
One of the changes was to start fighting, with the help of Turkey, the Kurds in northern Syria, under the claim that they wanted to fragment Syrian territory. In addition, the Sunni-oriented HTS joined the group, which was, until 2016, the armed wing of al-Qaeda in Syria and then the former Iraqi wing of al-Qaeda, known as the Islamic State (IS), which invaded the country and conquered part of the territory.
The terrorist organization posed a real threat to the government of Bashar al-Assad and other groups in Syria, which led to a major internal and international mobilization against the advance of this organization.
Northern Syria has benefited in recent years from a precarious calm, made possible by a ceasefire established after an offensive by the regime in March 2020.
The truce was sponsored by Moscow and Turkey, which supports some Syrian rebel groups on its border.
The Syrian regime has regained control of much of the country with the support of its Russian and Iranian allies.
Since the beginning, the conflict has left more than half a million people dead and millions of people refugees and displaced.
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