More than 700 deaths in a week, 110 of them civilians, NGO reports // Blinken warns about the resurgence of the Islamic State in the area
â–²Militia fighters load a rocket launcher on the outskirts of Hama.Photo Afp
AFP, AP and Europa Press
La Jornada Newspaper
Thursday, December 5, 2024, p. 25
Lebanon. There is numerous civilian victims in the fighting taking place in Syria, the United Nations (UN) said yesterday, when the clashes and bombings have left 704 dead in one week, including 110 civilians, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH). , based in London.
For now, the troops of President Bashar al Assad, who ordered a 50 percent salary increase for his troops, launched a counteroffensive to try to stop the pro-Turkish militiamen who arrived at the gates of the city of Hama, a strategic city. because its dominance is essential to prevent the attacking forces from reaching the capital, located about 200 kilometers away.
After a lightning advance from the north, fighters from the pro-Turkish Hayat Tahrir al Sham (HTS), the former Syrian branch of Al Qaeda, surrounded Hama from three sides. They are about 3 or 4 kilometers from the city and government forces They only have one exit towards Homs, to the southspecified the OSDH.
Last night the sounds of the incessant bombing were terrifyingWassim, a 36-year-old driver, told the AFP news agency. We have been tired and nervous for four dayshe added.
The Syrian army responded with large military convoys that are heading to Hama and have support from Russian aviation, which led to bloody confrontationsindicated the official Sana agency.
The Kurdish authorities, who control some regions in the northeast of the country, called urgent of humanitarian aid before the arrival of a large number of displaced people.
More than 150,000 people have left their homes in a week of fighting in the province of Aleppo, reported the representative of the head of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Syria, Gonzalo Vargas Llosa.
In 2011, anti-government protests led to a civil war that has left more than half a million dead; Relative calm had reigned since 2020, until on November 27, HTS took several cities, including Aleppo, which for the first time is outside Damascus’s control.
The head of HTS, Abu Mohamad Jolani, walked through Aleppo yesterday, surrounded by armed men, masked and wearing bulletproof vests. He smiled and waved dressed in dark green military clothing, and as he passed men and children chanted God is greatthe group showed on Telegram.
I dream that our work of removing bodies from the rubble endsstated the head of the white helmets Syrians, Raed Saleh. 14 years after the start of the civil war, life without humanitarian aid remains unthinkable in Syria: more than 20 million children and adults suffer from violence and hunger, reported the German channel Deutsche Welle.
The US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, warned yesterday of a resurgence of the jihadist group Islamic State (IS) in Syria, where in 2014 he proclaimed a caliphate that was defeated. We still have security interests in this country, particularly that ISIS does not resurrecthe pointed out.
Allied forces defeated IS in Iraq (2017) and Syria (2019), but the group still operates in remote areas of the region, where Washington’s military presence continues as part of the international anti-jihadist coalition.