Syrian rebels seize second largest city after army retreat
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A Syrian rebel fighter fires into the air in the city of Hama, Syria
Syrian rebels celebrate in the streets of Hama after Syrian army retreat
Syrian rebels say they have taken full control of a second major city after the army withdrew its troops from Hama in a fresh setback for President Bashar al-Assad.
The leader of the Islamist militant group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani, declared Hama a "victory" and vowed there would be "no reprisals".
Earlier, HTS fighters and their allies seized control of Hama's central prison and freed prisoners amid heavy fighting, while the army said it had redeployed troops outside the city.
Hama is home to one million people and is 110km south of Aleppo, which rebels overran last week after launching a surprise offensive from their northwestern stronghold.
A rebel commander told residents of Homs, the southern city on the Aleppo-Damascus highway, that "your time has come." In the past, President Assad has relied on Russia and Iran to suppress his opponents.
But with both allies preoccupied with their own affairs, it is unclear how — or if — he will be able to stop a breakthrough that could threaten the survival of his government.
More than half a million people have been killed since a civil war erupted in 2011 after Assad's government violently suppressed peaceful pro-democracy protests.
Map of Syria's control (December 4, 2024)
Rebels have broken through government defense lines north of Hama after days of heavy fighting.
The army had sent reinforcements to the city after the fall of Aleppo. Despite support from Russian airstrikes and Iranian-backed militias, troops were unable to prevent the capture of Hama on Thursday.
Rebel commander Hassan Abdul Ghani said in the morning that his fighters were engaged in intense fighting in several neighborhoods.
In the early afternoon, he announced that hundreds of prisoners from Hama Central Prison had been released.
Minutes later, the army announced the redeployment of troops outside Hama "to preserve civilian life and prevent urban fighting."
Photos and videos posted online and verified by the BBC showed fighters in several neighborhoods in the northeast. The released detainees were also filmed celebrating their release outside the central prison with a rebel and a journalist from a media outlet close to the opposition.
Abdul Ghani later said: "We are happy to report that Hama has been fully liberated after our forces completed their search operations."
He also said the rebels had cleared Hama's military airport, on the western outskirts of the city, as well as Jabal Zain al-Abadin, a strategically important hill in the northeast that overlooks the Damascus-Aleppo highway.
In a video, Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani said his fighters had entered Hama to "cleanse the wound that has lasted 40 years in Syria."
"I pray to God Almighty that it will be an invasion without revenge," he added.
The HTS leader was referring to the deaths of 10,000 to 25,000 people in the city in 1982, when former President Hafez al-Assad sent tanks and artillery to crush an Islamist uprising. Similar tactics have been used across the country by his son, Bashar, over the past 13 years.
AFP A Syrian Kurdish woman holds a child in Tabqa after fleeing northern Aleppo (December 4, 2024) AFP
The UN says the escalation has displaced more than 280,000 people in northwest Syria.
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The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a UK-based monitoring group, says more than 820 people - most of them fighters, but also 111 civilians - have been killed across the country since the rebel offensive began eight days ago. .
The UN said the fighting had also "exacerbated an already dire situation for civilians in the north of the country".
Some 280,000 people have been displaced, most of them women and children, and some civilians are trapped in frontline areas, unable to reach safer places.
In Aleppo, home to two million people, some public services and essential facilities - including hospitals, bakeries, power plants, water, internet and telecommunications - are disrupted or non-functional due to lack of supplies and personnel. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on "all those with influence to do their part" to end the civil war.
"We are seeing the bitter fruits of a chronic collective failure of previous de-escalation agreements to produce a genuine national ceasefire or a serious political process," he added. "That has to change."
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President Assad has vowed to "crush" the rebels and accused Western powers of trying to redraw the map of the region, while his key allies Russia and Iran have offered "unconditional support."
Russian warplanes have stepped up attacks on rebel-held areas in recent days, Iranian-backed militias have sent fighters to bolster government defense lines, and Iran has said it is ready to send additional forces to Syria if needed. Turkey, which supports the Syrian opposition but has denied involvement in the HTS-led offensive, has urged Assad to engage in a political process with the opposition to end Syria's 13-year civil war.
Meanwhile, Turkish-backed rebel factions have taken advantage of the government's retreat in the north to launch a separate offensive in territory near Aleppo held by an alliance of Kurdish-led militias, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). Turkey, which has a large and restive Kurdish minority, views Syria's Kurds as a threat.
AFP A rebel fighter covers his ears as a multiple-barrelled missile is fired at government forces on the outskirts of the city of Hama in central Syria (December 4, 2024) AFP
The rebels have been advancing on Hama from the north after seizing the second city of Aleppo
Before the rebel offensive began, the government had regained control of Syria's main cities with the help of Russia, Iran and Iranian-backed militias. However, much of the country remains outside its control The rebels' last stronghold was in the provinces of Aleppo and Idlib, on the border with Turkey, home to more than four million people, many of whom had been displaced from government-held areas.
The enclave was dominated by HTS, which is considered a terrorist organization by the UN, the US, Turkey and other countries because it was linked to al-Qaeda in Syria until it officially severed its ties in 2016.
A number of allied rebel factions and jihadist groups were also based there, as well as NSA factions backed by Turkey and Turkish forces.
HTS and its allies said on November 27 that they had launched an offensive to "repel aggression," accusing the government and allied militias backed by Iran of stepping up attacks on civilians in the northwest.
But this came at a time when the government's allies were worried about other conflicts. The Iranian-backed Lebanese Hezbollah, which played a crucial role in the fight against the rebels at the beginning of the war, has recently suffered from the Israeli offensive in Lebanon. Its new leader, Naim Qassem, said on Thursday that he "stands with Syria to prevent as much as possible the targets of this aggression."
Israeli strikes have also eliminated Iranian military commanders in Syria and degraded supply lines to pro-government militias.
Russia is also distracted by the war in Ukraine.
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