Dozens killed as anti-Daesh fight in Damascus stalls

Regime has retaken 60% of Hajar Al Aswad, but Daesh still controls 80% of Yarmouk

At least 86 pro-regime fighters were killed in Syria over the past week in battles against Daesh as regime forces push to clear extremists from their last stronghold in Damascus, a monitor said yesterday.

The extremists have lost 57 fighters in the clashes in the Hajar Al Aswad district on the outskirts of Damascus since May 5, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Since mid-April, forces loyal to Bashar Al Assad have pounded Daesh in its last Damascus bastion.

Retaking the area, which includes Hajar Al Aswad and the Palestinian refugee camp of Yarmouk, would place the regime in full control of the capital and its surroundings for the first time since 2012.

“The clashes continue. Despite its firepower, the regime has been unable to achieve any significant advance on the ground for a week,” Observatory director Rami Abdul Rahman said.

“Daesh is entrenched in tunnels and underground shelters and it has been conducting counter-attacks since Saturday.”

At least 203 pro-regime fighters have been killed along with 159 Daesh terrorists since April 19, according to the Observatory. Regime forces have retaken 60 per cent of Hajar Al Aswad, but extremists still control 80 per cent of Yarmouk, the monitor said. Once a thriving district home to some 160,000 Palestinians and Syrians, Yarmouk’s population has fallen to just a few hundred people.

The regime continued to pound the area with air strikes and artillery fire yesterday, the Observatory said.

Daesh has been expelled from most of the country since it declared a so-called “caliphate” across large swathes of Syria and neighbouring Iraq in 2014. But it still holds around five per cent of Syrian territory, in eastern and central desert holdouts and on the edge of Damascus.

Syria’s war has killed more than 400,000 people since it started in 2011.

Once a thriving district home to some 160,000 Palestinians and Syrians, Yarmouk’s population has fallen to a few hundred people.