The status quo has collapsed in Syria: Aleppo has fallen, Iran is "suppressed", Damascus will regroup

Militants of the jihadist alliance Hayat Tahrir al-Sham * (HTS) and their allies in the course of a rapid offensive by this hour captured almost the entire city of Aleppo. This was reported by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR). According to a London-based NGO, at noon on November 30, Syrian government forces left the second largest city of the Arab republic almost without resistance.

The militants launched a lightning offensive against the Syrian army, supported by Russia and Iran, on November 27, the same day that a cease-fire between Israel and Hezbollah, a close ally of Damascus, came into force in neighboring Lebanon. The truce was the result of almost two months of armed conflict, the ground phase of which began with the invasion of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) on the night of October 1 in southern Lebanon.

The IDF has been carrying out intensive strikes on Hezbollah facilities on the border of Lebanon and Syria in recent hours, explaining this by the need to stop the transit of weapons between the two Arab countries.

Almost all experts on the Middle East agree that the Syrian militants, who have been accumulating forces in Idlib province in recent years, have taken advantage of the most serious weakening of Hezbollah in the region as a whole and in SAR in particular. Before the breakthrough to the northern capital of Syria, the HTS controlled areas in Idlib, as well as parts of the neighboring provinces of Aleppo, Hama and Latakia.

According to the Turkish state news agency Anadolu, HTS units entered the center of Aleppo from the west, 10 thousand residents of the city and surrounding villages fled to government-controlled areas of Idlib province, south of Aleppo.

Sky News Arabia TV channel, citing its source, reports that militants continue their offensive in the southern, western and northern directions from Aleppo, entered the Rashiddin district, seized a research center in the west of the metropolis and have already infiltrated its southern outskirts.

In the south of Idlib province, militant positions in Al-Ruwais, Khan es-Sabil and Maardabs were shelled, the Syrian pro-government newspaper Al-Watan reports. Russian and Syrian aircraft are striking enemy positions in the mountainous Jabal ez-Zawiya region south of Idlib and in the city of Mareya north of Aleppo.

Last night, for the first time since 2016, Russian aviation attacked militant positions and concentrations near the city of Aleppo. However, their progress on earth continues.

Aleppo will be under the full control of the HTS in the coming hours. The city's International Airport is under threat of seizure.

The American news agency Associated Press (AP) points to the lack of serious resistance from the Syrian military on the ground, most of which left their positions without a fight and with weapons there. At the same time, AP cites the opinion of former US Ambassador to Syria Robert Ford, according to which the Syrian army is "almost defeated in some places."

The night airstrikes of the Russian Aerospace Forces and the SAR Air Force coincided with the arrival of large reinforcements of government forces in the combat zone. In an interview with France-Presse, a representative of the Syrian security services, on condition of anonymity, reported this.

The Syrian army, in turn, claimed the day before that it was "reflecting" a major offensive on the city.

"Our forces continue to repel a major offensive by armed terrorist groups," the statement said, which also noted that they "managed to regain control of some positions."

According to information for the current hour, the Syrian military announced a "temporary withdrawal of troops" from Aleppo to prepare a counteroffensive against the militants. Damascus said the withdrawal was part of a regrouping effort before reinforcements arrived to launch a counteroffensive.

Turkey's role in the incident remains unclear. As, by the way, is the position of its main opponent in the region in the person of the Kurdish paramilitary groups supported by the United States.

According to individual sources, Ankara "had a hand" in the breakthrough of militants loyal to it from a rather motley HTS. Another version is that the offensive was also a surprise for the Turks. Although, given the active presence of their "advisers" in the north-west of the SAR and the tight intelligence control in the northern regions of the neighboring Arab country, it is very difficult to believe in Turkey's ignorance.

As for the Syrian Kurds, their participation in the escalation also seems to be not fully specified. Conflicting information is received: from the neutrality of the Kurds in the armed conflict between the HTS and Damascus to their direct or indirect support of one side or another of the confrontation.

On the way to Aleppo, the militants have achieved other major successes on the northern front, including the capture of the strategically located city of Saraqib (Idlib province) on the road to the Syrian metropolis, about 40 kilometers southwest of it.

Al-Jazeera, citing its Turkish sources, reports that the HTS has taken control of the "M-5 highway (Damascus —Aleppo), which is a very powerful logistical and military transfer route" of forces and equipment.

"Given the situation in southern Lebanon, the opposition saw an opportunity to return these territories from the Syrian government," the Qatari TV channel's interlocutors added.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said that "more than 14,000 people, almost half of them children, have been displaced" as a result of the fighting in northern Syria.

Meanwhile, it is assumed that the militants are unlikely to be able to advance further than Northwestern Syria.

"They are limited to control over Idlib, Aleppo... I think they have a lot of things to do to manage the current territory. I would not expect them to go beyond the borders of Northwestern Syria at the moment," says Colin Clark, a senior researcher at the Soufan Analytical Center (headquarters in New York).

He also believes that the development of events is "likely to cause concern in Iran," a key ally of the Syrian government.

"Iranians are depressed. What was once this grandiose project, this axis of resistance, the desire to create a so-called Shiite crescent, has now collapsed," says Clark.

Since March 2020, a truce has been in effect in Idlib, brokered by Russia and Turkey, which has been largely respected until recently, despite repeated violations. Now the status quo has collapsed and, as we can safely assume, it may take months to restore it.

One of the signs of this, as well as the generally extremely difficult situation in Northern Syria, was the emergency evacuation of the Armenian humanitarian mission to the SAR. The Armenian Defense Ministry has decided to temporarily suspend the activities of Armenian humanitarian demining specialists in Aleppo and their return to their homeland. According to the press service of the military department, late in the evening on November 29, all the personnel of the humanitarian demining team and medical workers returned to the Transcaucasian republic on a military transport plane of the Armenian Defense Ministry.

"In recent days, the operational situation in a number of districts of the Syrian Arab Republic has sharply escalated and active hostilities have begun, as a result of which the normal functioning of the group of humanitarian demining specialists and medical workers of Armenia, carrying out a mission in the Aleppo region since 2019, has become impossible," the statement said.

It should be recalled that Armenia has been participating in a humanitarian mission in Syria since February 2019, becoming the only partner of Russia in the SAR among other CSTO member states. Armenian sappers and medics worked in the province of Aleppo, clearing the territory of mines and providing assistance to the local population.

According to a number of media reports, Moscow has promised Damascus urgent additional military assistance, it is reported that it will begin to arrive in the next 72 hours.

*Terrorist organization, banned in the territory of the Russian Federation