What results for this offensive?
While the province of Aleppo, long the epicenter of the Syrian rebellion, has returned entirely to the control of government forces since 2020, a vast offensive by jihadists from the city of Idlib, but also from the neighboring territories of Hama and Latakia , bastions of resistance to the Syrian president, has been carried out there since Wednesday, November 27.
A coalition of fighters from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the former Syrian branch of Al Qaeda, and groups allied to them, arrived this Friday on the outskirts of Aleppo, the country's second city, which they are bombing. Four civilians were killed in the university campus, according to the official Sana agency.
In the operation the jihadists, who encountered only weak resistance, cut Thursday the vital road linking the capital Damascus to Aleppo, conquered around fifty localities but also captured soldiers and government military equipment, according to videos posted on social networks. A push that continues this Friday.
In total, the death toll from the fighting since Wednesday stands at at least 242 dead, most of them fighters from both camps, according to NGOs and Syrian media. But also 24 civilians killed, including 19 in strikes by Russian aircraft, an ally of the regime, on rebel areas, reports the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH).
The UN Office of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) indicated that “more than 14,000 people, almost half of whom are children, have been displaced” due to the violence. Kioumars Pourhashemi, general of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, who was there, was also killed, according to an Iranian news agency.
How to explain the weakness of the Syrian dictator?
According to analyst Nick Heras, of the New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy, cited by Le Monde, the rebels “tried to anticipate the possibility of a Syrian military campaign in the Aleppo region, which was being prepared by air strikes from the Russian and Syrian governments. And particularly towards Idlib, where many refugees from the region are flocking who dream of returning home and have put pressure on the jihadists of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham to launch the operation.
Operation made possible by the current weakness of the two main allies of the Syrian president. Firstly, Russia which, caught in Ukraine, is no longer capable of militarily supporting the regime as in 2016, when it enabled a spectacular recovery of the regime. And this despite some retaliatory bombings carried out in recent days.
But also Hezbollah supported by Iran, decapitated in Lebanon by Israel's recent military operations and no longer able to help its Shiite ally Bashar al-Assad as powerfully as before. It was also Shiite militias who held the positions which collapsed in the face of the jihadist surge in recent days.
“We demand that the Syrian authorities bring order to this area as quickly as possible and restore constitutional order,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters, denouncing the ongoing offensive as an “attack on the sovereignty of Syria”.
What is Turkey's role?
Turkey, very present in the rebel zone and which necessarily at least validated the operation, “sends a message to Damascus and Moscow so that they renounce their military efforts in the north-west of Syria”, added analyst Nick Heras. With the aim of allowing the large number of Syrian refugees living in Turkey to one day return home.
