Syrian govt delivers supplies to Aleppo via alternative route -monitors

A coalition of rebels and militants surged through regime territory to open a new route into Aleppo’s besieged eastern neighbourhoods, home to about 250,000 people.

Agitator alliance said, it has launched a battle to summon up whole city after breaking a three-week government blockade.

Syrian warplanes have been bombing the Ramousah area, where the rebels advanced and cut the road on Saturday, leaving no safe passage for civilians, the Observatory said.

Syrian Civil Defense volunteers and a freelance journalist on the ground, Karam al Masri, say that a small number of trucks carrying relief have reached eastern Aleppo since the government lines were punctured.

After days of ferocious fighting in what it has named “The Great Battle for Aleppo”, the Islamist-led rebel coalition known as Jaysh al Fateh broke through government lines in southwest Aleppo Saturday, capturing the strategic district of Ramouseh.

The leader of a Syrian opposition group, Anas al-Abdah, meanwhile, hailed the breaching of the Syrian government siege on opposition neighborhoods of Aleppo as “miraculous”.

A western Aleppo resident said supplies had arrived.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad wants to take full control of Aleppo, pre-war Syria’s most populous city, which has been divided between rebel and government-held areas.

Emboldened by the victory, the fighters – largely grouped under the banner of the Army of Conquest – set their sights on recapturing all of Aleppo.

The Fatah Army – a coalition of rebel groups including factions of the Free Syrian Army and the former Al Qaeda-affiliate Nusra Front, now under its new name Jabhat Fatah al Sham – has announced a new offensive to liberate the entire city from regime control.

“I think nearly all the armed groups participated. and for the first time they showed a very professional level of coordination and work”. “We can not allow this to happen”, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power said.

Despite more than 600 Russian strikes, the regime forces were not able to hold on to their positions.

Washington’s United Nations envoy Samantha Power said: “Neither side will be able to win a swift or decisive victory in the battle for Aleppo”. Fighters besieged in the city coordinated with the Army of Conquest alliance, which includes the Levant Conquest Front, the rebranded al-Qaida branch in Syria, based in neighboring Idlib province.

“After a large-scale military operation carried out in six stages, the Conquest Army managed to put an end to the siege”, Al Jazeera’s Amro Halabi, reporting from the rebel-held half of the city, said.

Pierret said a rebel win would confine the regime to an arc of territory between the western coastal areas and the Golan Heights, while a regime victory could lead to the “collapse” of the insurgency.

“This is the new route that the regime forces are securing as a temporary alternative to the route they previously depended on”, Abdel Rahman said.

Head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Rami Abdel Rahman said it is most significant setbacks for government forces since the conflict explode in March 2011.

A Video footage shows fighters on Sunday evacuating a small group of civilians, mostly women and children, from Ramussa, seen by AFP.

Global efforts to resolve the conflict have repeatedly failed though the United Nations is hoping that peace talks can resume later this month.