Syria rebel enclave is Assad regime’s weak spot, say experts

BEIRUT: Syria’s rebel-held enclave of Eastern Ghouta near the capital is the regime’s Achilles heel, and because of this it faces an almost inevitable military offensive, experts say.

The battle-scarred region east of Damascus, which has been under near-daily bombardment and a crippling government siege since 2013, is strategically vital to President Bashar al-Assad.

Despite residents facing a humanitarian crisis, rebels controlling the region have been able to use it as a launch pad for rocket and mortar attacks on the capital.

Joshua Landis, director of the Centre for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, said the ongoing rebellion in Eastern Ghouta contrasted with the regime “presenting itself as the winner” of Syria’s war elsewhere.

“The persistence of the East Ghouta resistance has become a major embarrassment and liability for the Assad regime,” he said.

The Assad regime, militarily backed by its ally Russia, has retaken control of more than half of the country with a string of victories against rebel and jihadist forces.

“It hopes to convince the international community that it faces little opposition any more save for the enclaves on the margins of Syria,” Landis said.

But rebel and jihadist groups managed this week to surround a regime base on the edge of Eastern Ghouta, prompting intensified regime air strikes there.

Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said the enclave is the regime’s “weak spot”.

“The factions there are strong and directly threaten Damascus,” he said.

Even though Eastern Ghouta was one of four “de-escalation zones” agreed under a deal between rebel and regime backers, fighting has continued there.

The enclave’s estimated 400,000 inhabitants are suffering severe shortages of food and medicine.

Children there are particularly vulnerable to malnutrition.

Despite the civilian suffering caused by the blockade, rebel groups in Ghouta “still have a popular base, because thousands of their fighters are from the region”, Abdel Rahman said. — AFP