Govt forces pile pressure on rebel stronghold
BEirUT: Syrian troops captured a major rebel stronghold east of the capital Damascus and took large parts of another, squeezing insurgents and forcing thousands to flee to regions controlled by the government.
The Britain- based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and Oways al-Shami of the Syrian Civil Defence said troops have taken Kafr Batna and large parts of nearby Saqba.
The capture of Kafr Batna and parts of nearby Saqba is another blow to opposition fighters who have lost more than 70% of the area known as Eastern Ghouta since President Bashar Assad’s forces began its crushing offensive under the cover of air strikes on Feb 18.
The violence left nearly 1,400 people dead, more than 5,000 wounded and forced tens of thousands to seek shelter in areas under government control.
The intensity of the shelling and air strikes have made it almost impossible for ambulances to move and wounded people cannot reach clinics, said Hamza Hassan, a surgeon working at one of the hospitals in Eastern Ghouta.
Syrian state news agency SANA said the army stepped up military
operations in Eastern Ghouta and inflicted “heavy losses on terrorist groups in personnel and military hardware”.
It said troops reached the centre of Kafr Batna and Saqba.
With the capture of Kafr Batna and parts of Saqba, rebels still con-
trol the towns of Arbeen, Zamalka, Ein Tarma and Jobar on the southern edge of Eastern Ghouta.
Eastern Ghouta has been split to three parts – the largest rebel-held town of Douma to the north has been cut off from nearby Harasta, and both have been split off from the rest of the area.
The Observatory said 30 people were killed in a Saturday morning air strike on Zamalka that hit a group of people trying to flee into government-controlled areas.
The opposition’s Syrian Civil Defence said the air strike killed dozens and wounded scores, adding that paramedics are trying to help survivors.
“The world has betrayed us,” said Ahmad Khanshour, a resident of Eastern Ghouta, referring to the international community that could not do very much to stop the offensive.
“The world betrayed itself and the human values we all once shared,” Ahmad lamented.
He added that some 300,000 people are still besieged in Eastern Ghouta, left to choose between “dying under fire or surrendering and (going) to Assad’s jails and slaughterhouses”.
Speaking about the capture of Kafr Batna, al-Shami of the Syrian Civil Defence said people “fled in the streets not knowing in which direction to go”.
He added that large numbers of people have now been squeezed into the small areas held by rebels in Eastern Ghouta.