More than 40 fighters were killed Monday in clashes in northwestern Syria, where regime forces repelled an attack by an Al Qaeda-linked jihadist group launched despite a truce, according to an NGO. In recent weeks, sporadic fighting and artillery fire has taken place in the province of Idleb and adjacent territories, a region that constitutes the last great jihadist and rebel stronghold in Syria.
A ceasefire, brokered by Moscow, a regime ally, and Turkey, the sponsor of some rebel groups, came into effect in March after several months of a deadly offensive by Syrian power backed by Russian air forces.
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According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH), Houras al-Din, a group linked to the Al-Qaeda network, and other jihadist groups have launched an offensive against two villages controlled by the regime in the Sahl area al-Ghab, in the northwest of the province of Hama which adjoins that of Idleb. Nineteen members of the regime's forces were killed, as were 22 jihadists, according to OSDH director Rami Abdel Rahmane. The jihadists then withdrew from the two villages. In Damascus, a military source quoted by the official Sana agency, confirmed an attack on "two army positions" carried out "by suicide bombers and vehicles stuffed with explosives" , as well as the withdrawal of the attackers.
With 1,800 men, the small group Houras al-Din also brings together foreigners and sometimes fights alongside the jihadists of Hayat Tahrir al-Cham, a former Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda which dominates the province of Idleb, according to the Observatory .
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The precarious truce came into effect after the regime relaunched its offensive against this region in December with the support of the Russian air force. Some 500 civilians had perished according to the OSDH and nearly a million had been displaced according to the UN. On June 3, the Russian air force carried out raids against jihadist positions in an area on the edge of the provinces of Hama, Idleb and Latakia. These were the first strikes by the Damascus ally in three months on this region.
Aided by the Russian air force, the Bashar al-Assad regime regained control of half of the province of Idleb, but also of important areas in the neighboring provinces of Hama, Aleppo and Latakia. In recent years and still thanks to the crucial support of Russia, it has managed to take back more than 70% of Syrian territory.
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Triggered in 2011 with the repression by the power of pro-democracy demonstrations, the war in Syria has left more than 380,000 dead and displaced millions of people. It has become more complex over the years with the involvement of national and international actors, in addition to that of jihadist groups.
