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By\u00a0Raja Abdulrahim<\/a>, Nov. 29, 2024<\/p>\n\n\n\n Syrian rebels reached the outskirts of the major city of Aleppo on Friday, according to the fighters and a war monitor, raising fears that the nation\u2019s long-running civil war is reigniting with an intensity not seen in years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Government forces and their Russian allies launched intense airstrikes on opposition-held territory on Friday, including 23 attacks on the city of Idlib, according to the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war monitoring group. But on the ground, the rebel fighters did not appear to meet much resistance from government forces, according to the rebels, Syrian media and the Observatory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The rebel offensive launched on Wednesday<\/a> is the most serious challenge to President Bashar al-Assad\u2019s regime in years. And the timing of it has raised questions about whether the rebels are trying to take advantage of weakness across an alliance with Iran at the center, and groups like Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Syrian regime closely aligned with it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But rebels said they had been preparing the offensive for months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Weapons and money have long flowed from Iran across Syria\u2019s borders to Hezbollah in Lebanon, part of a so-called \u2018axis of resistance\u2019 that includes the Palestinian armed group Hamas in Gaza. Iran and Hezbollah also provided vital military support to Mr. al-Assad that helped him survive the civil war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But now, Hezbollah, Hamas and Iran have all been weakened by more than a year of conflict with Israel. A cease-fire this week halted more than 13 months of war between Israel and Hezbollah while Israel\u2019s war against Hamas in Gaza continues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Israel has been bombing Syria for months, targeting Iranian commanders<\/a> and fighters in the country and weapons shipments transiting through Syria to Hezbollah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At the same time, Mr. al-Assad\u2019s other key military ally, Russia, is bogged down in the war in Ukraine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The rapid shifts over the past three days \u201cserve as a powerful reminder that the Syrian conflict is far from \u201cfrozen,\u201d said Mohammed Alaa Ghanem, head of policy for the Syrian American Council, a Washington-based advocacy group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhat remains clear is that these developments expose Assad\u2019s deep vulnerabilities and his regime\u2019s lack of popular legitimacy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Syrian civil war began in 2011, displaced about half of the country\u2019s population and sent millions of refugees seeking safety in neighboring countries like Turkey and Lebanon, and beyond to Europe. It has been largely stagnant for years, but on Wednesday, fighters from an array of armed opposition factions launched the surprise offensive against the government in the northwestern province of Aleppo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The scenes that have unfolded over the past three days \u2014 in videos and images shared by the rebels and Syrian media \u2014 are eerily reminiscent of the early stages of the civil war. This time around, as before, rebels claimed to have captured a series of towns, neighborhoods, military bases and weaponry, while issuing calls for government soldiers to defect and join their ranks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The last major escalation in the civil war was in early 2020, when Russian-backed Syrian forces launched a widespread offensive against rebels in opposition-dominated Idlib province, capturing several towns and cities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That fighting ended in a cease-fire brokered by Russia and Turkey<\/a>, which has supported the opposition since the early days of the war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The anti-government fighters managed on Friday to breach five neighborhoods in the western part of the city of Aleppo after detonating two car bombs targeting government soldiers, according to the rebels and the Observatory. The monitoring group did not provide further details on the car bombings, and it was not immediately clear whether there were casualties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Three days of fierce clashes have killed more than 250 combatants on both sides, including more than 140 from rebel groups and 87 government soldiers and Iran-backed fighters, according to the Observatory<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The rebels posted a map on the Telegram messaging app along with evacuation warnings to civilians in the city of Aleppo, urging people to move to eastern neighborhoods \u201cfor your safety.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Syrian state media claimed that government forces had repelled the rebel advance and inflicted heavy losses on the other side. The rebels did not immediately respond to the claim, which could not be independently confirmed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The White Helmets, a first-responder organization based in opposition-held areas of Syria, reported numerous civilians had been killed or injured in the government airstrikes on Friday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The rebels come from an array of armed opposition factions, including Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which was once linked with the terror group Al Qaeda but publicly broke ties with it years ago. Turkish-backed rebel groups are also taking part.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Though the Syrian civil war has been mostly been frozen for years, clashes along front lines have continued to break out periodically and opposition-held areas are regularly hit by government airstrikes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Rebels said the goal of their assault is to try to stop airstrikes on opposition-held areas by government forces and their allies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a video statement announcing the offensive, Lt. Col. Hassan Abdulghany, military commander of the opposition\u2019s operations room, said the decision to launch the attack was forced on the opposition forces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt is an obligation to defend our people and their land,\u201d he said. \u201cIt has become clear to everyone that the regime militias and their allies, including the Iranian mercenaries, have declared an open war on the Syrian people.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Iran has backed<\/a> the Syrian government throughout the war, sending advisers and commanders of its powerful Revolutionary Guards force to bases and front lines, along with allied militias with thousands of fighters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Muhammad Haj Kadour\u00a0contributed reporting.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Raja Abdulrahim<\/a>\u00a0reports on the Middle East and is based in Jerusalem.\u00a0More about Raja Abdulrahim<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n See more on:\u00a0Bashar al-Assad<\/a>,\u00a0Syrian Observatory for Human Rights<\/a>,\u00a0Free Syrian Army<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n A new rebel assault on Syrian regime forces was closing in on the major city of Aleppo, according to rebels and a war monitor. Government warplanes struck rebel territory. Listen to this article\u00a0\u00b7 6:05 min\u00a0Learn more By\u00a0Raja Abdulrahim, Nov. 29, 2024 Syrian rebels reached the outskirts of the major city of Aleppo on Friday, according […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1001004,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15815"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1001004"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15815"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15815\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15816,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15815\/revisions\/15816"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15815"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15815"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15815"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"