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Insurgents entered Syria's second-largest city on Friday and clashed with government forces for the first time since 2016, according to a war monitor and fighters, in a surprise attack that sent residents fleeing and added new uncertainty to a region in turmoil. was shaken by several wars.
The advance on Aleppo followed a shock offensive launched by insurgents on Wednesday, as thousands of fighters swept through towns and cities in Syria's northwestern countryside. According to witnesses in Aleppo, residents fled neighborhoods on the outskirts of the city because of rockets and gunfire.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the country's unresolved civil war, said dozens of fighters from both sides were killed.
Fighting over the past three days has left 27 civilians dead, including eight children, a UN official said on Friday.
The attack injected new violence into a region struggling with twin wars in Gaza and Lebanon involving Israel and other conflicts including the Syrian civil war that began in 2011.
Aleppo has not been attacked by opposition forces since they were expelled from its eastern neighbors in 2016 after a grueling military campaign in which Syrian government forces were backed by Russia, Iran and its allied groups.
But this time there was no significant pushback from government forces or their allies. Instead, reports emerged that government forces were melting under the advance, and insurgents posted messages on social media calling on troops to surrender.
A UN official says at least 27 civilians have been killed in recent days after a militant group, reportedly the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, launched attacks on towns and villages in Aleppo province.
Government forces 'extremely weak'
Robert Ford, the last US ambassador to Syria, said the attack showed that Syrian government forces are “extremely weak.” In some cases, he said, they appear to have “almost fled.”
This week's advances are among the largest in recent years by opposition factions, led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group (HTS), and represent the most intense fighting in northwestern Syria since 2020, when government forces seized areas previously controlled by the opposition.
The offensive came as Iranian-affiliated groups, especially the Lebanese Hezbollah, which has supported Syrian government forces since 2015, were engaged in their own fighting at home.
A ceasefire in Hezbollah's two-month war with Israel came into effect on Wednesday, the day Syrian opposition factions announced their offensive. Israel has also escalated its attacks on Hezbollah Targets linked to Iran in Syria for the past 70 days.
Dareen Khalifa, a senior adviser at the International Crisis Group and an expert on Syrian groups, said the insurgents have been signaling for some time that they are ready for an offensive. But no one expected the rapid advance of the armed forces towards Aleppo.
“It's not just that the Russians are distracted and stuck in Ukraine, but also that the Iranians are distracted and stuck elsewhere. Hezbollah is distracted and stalled elsewhere, and the regime is absolutely cornered,” she said.
“But the element of surprise emerges in the speed with which the regime fell apart.”
Weeks of simmering low-level violence
The attack on Aleppo followed weeks of simmering low-level violence, including government attacks on opposition-held areas. Turkey, which has backed Syrian opposition groups, failed in its diplomatic efforts to prevent the government attacks, which were seen as a violation of a 2019 agreement sponsored by Russia, Turkey and Iran to freeze the line of conflict.
Turkish security officials said Thursday that Syrian opposition groups initially launched a long-planned “limited” offensive toward Aleppo, where attacks on civilians originated. However, the offensive expanded as Syrian government forces began withdrawing from their positions, the officials said.
The aim of the offensive, according to Turkish officials, was to restore the borders of the de-escalation zone. The Syrian government did not comment on insurgents breaching Aleppo's city limits.
The Kremlin said Friday that it considers the attack a violation of Syrian sovereignty and that it supports the fastest possible establishment of constitutional order in the region.
“This is obviously a violation of Syrian sovereignty in this region,” Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said at a news conference.
Insurgents now control seventy locations: Turkish state media
Syrian forces said in a statement on Friday that they clashed with insurgents in the countryside around Aleppo and Idlib, destroying drones and heavy weapons. They vowed to repel the attack and accused the insurgents of spreading false information about their claims.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said insurgents detonated two car bombs on the western outskirts of Aleppo on Friday. The war monitor said insurgents could also take control of Saraqeb, south of Aleppo, a city at the strategic intersection of highways linking Aleppo with Damascus and the coast. Syrian government authorities diverted traffic from that highway on Thursday.
A rebel commander posted a recorded message on social media calling on Aleppo residents to cooperate with advancing forces.
Turkey's state agency Anadolu reported that the insurgents entered the city center on Friday and now control about 70 locations in Aleppo and Idlib provinces. Syrian state media reported that insurgent projectiles hit student residences at Aleppo University in the city center, killing four people, including two students.
Syrian forces say the rebels are violating a 2019 agreement that de-escalated fighting in the area, the last opposition stronghold in years.
In a telephone conversation with his Syrian counterpart, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi described the insurgent attacks in Syria “as a plot orchestrated by the US and the Zionist regime after the regime's defeat in Lebanon and Palestine.”
