Rebel alliance launches ‘battle for all of Aleppo’

Regime and rebel forces have sent in hundreds of fighters and extra military equipment to join the crucial battle for Syria’s second city Aleppo, a monitoring group said Monday.

Reports of heavy fighting and air strikes from the area seemed to indicate any passage that may have been opened would be far from secure enough for civilians to travel through.

The offensive against the government’s Ramousah military complex, which contains a number of military colleges, began on Friday.

It would also give rebels access to armaments stored in the base, which has been used by the Syrian army in the country’s five-year conflict as a centre from which to shell opposition targets. The U.S State Department refused to make an official statement, commenting instead that the situation in Aleppo was “fluid”.

Over the weekend, rebels in a coalition known as Jaish al-Fatah launched a lightning advance that sealed the conquest of Ramouseh, a key district through which supplies flow to government forces in western Aleppo city.

“It’s a big slap in the face of the regime and allied militia forces”, said Assaad al-Achi, the director of Baytna Syria, an institution working with civil society groups. He said some 700 fighters from the government and the insurgent side were killed in the week of fighting.

At least one medical charity has reported the month of July as the worst to date for attacks on medical care centres in Syria, with 43 attacks on healthcare facilities recorded in their count. To this aim units from the neighboring provinces of Idlib and Hama will be deployed to the southern suburbs of the city.

The Syrian army has been fighting the rebels with the help of Russian air strikes.

SANA said the militant offensive was preceded by a number of auto bombs that struck the area. “The UN estimates that collectively all aid supplies in east Aleppo will only last about two more weeks”, Christy Delafield, senior communications officer for Mercy Corps, which runs the largest non-governmental aid operation inside Syria, told Reuters.

Speaking in Istanbul Monday, opposition leader al-Abdah praised the rebel fighters and said Aleppo residents had nothing to fear from the rebels, “because the main aspect of our work in Aleppo is to liberate them”.

The rebels were also believed to have taken control over parts of the strategic al-Ramuseh town, enabling them to fashion a military passageway into eastern Aleppo.

“People are impressed that in spite of all the airstrikes by the regime and the Russians, they managed to take territory and break the siege”, Masri said. Some 250,000 people reportedly live in the besieged areas.

Videos released by rebel groups claim to show gun battles as insurgents move into buildings in the complex.

“Not a single civilian has left the eastern districts because the road is too risky and not secured”, he said. The confederation’s push was a last chance opportunity to relieve the pressure on both the insurgent forces and the hundreds of thousands of civilians still residing in the city.

Citing a source on the ground, the newspaper said military warplanes “are carrying out a barrage of air strikes targeting the armed groups”.