Syria regime attack kills 23 rebels in truce zone

Syrian government forces killed 23 rebels near Idlib province yesterday, the deadliest clash to rock a buffer zone where a Russian-Turkish truce is to be enforced.

The attack on a position held by the Jaish al-Izza rebel group took place on the edge of the northwestern province of Idlib, in an area due to be de-militarised.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, government forces moved in to take a high building held by the rebels in a rural area of neighbouring Hama province.

Idlib and some surrounding areas are the last major rebel bastion in Syria, where the Russian-backed government has in recent months retaken much of the territory it had lost since the civil war erupted in 2011.

It had threatened an assault on rebel territory, home to around 3mn people, but a deal for a de-militarised buffer zone around it was reached in September between Moscow and rebel backer Ankara.

Several deadly skirmishes have occurred since the deal but 23 is the highest number of known fatalities in a single incident inside the planned buffer zone, the Observatory said.

“This is the highest death toll in the demilitarised zone since it was announced,” said Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Britain-based monitoring group.

He said at least 35 rebel fighters were also wounded in the clash but could not provide a casualty toll for government forces.

It was not clear what prompted the attack, which did not appear to signal any largescale government offensive or otherwise threaten the September 17 truce deal.

The government troops pulled out of the buffer zone after the flare-up, the Observatory said, adding that the fighting went on for much of the night.

Jaish al-Izza is a rebel group which was formerly supported by the United States and is mostly active in the Lataminah area of Hama province, where the attack took place.

It is not a member of the main rebel alliance in the Idlib area and after initially rejecting the truce deal struck by Moscow and Ankara, it had begun complying and pulling back its heavy weaponry.

The withdrawal of the most radical fighters and the removal of heavy weapons from the planned buffer zone has not happened in full but the agreement successfully averted an all-out government assault.

Aid organisations had warned that a fullyfledged offensive on Idlib could spark the worst humanitarian catastrophe of the civil war so far.

Moscow is expected to restrain Damascus while Ankara is supposed to use its leverage on the rebels, including militants, to get them to regroup in specified areas and halt attacks on strategic regime-held territory.

Only sporadic incidents have broken out in the 15- to 20-kilometre buffer zone in the past two months, killing 18 civilians and three fighters before yesterday’s clash.

The task assigned to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is near impossible, observers say, but the pause in fighting in Idlib has been largely respected.

“Erdogan knows Russia needs him to ultimately convert its military victory into a political victory in Syria,” said Karim Emile Bitar, of the Paris-based Institute of International and Strategic Affairs.

He has since shifted the focus to northeastern Syria, where he has been threatening a military assault against Kurdish-held areas along the border. The Kurds are the main allies of the US-led coalition in its push against the last pocket controlled by the Islamic State group in eastern Syria. In response to the Turkish threats, they have suspended their involvement in the fight against the militants, leaving Washington in a bind.

Meanwhile, US-led coalition air strikes killed 26 civilians including 14 children in a holdout of the Islamic State group in eastern Syria, a Britain-based war monitor said.

“Twenty-six IS family members including 14 children and 9 women were killed in coalition air strikes on Friday morning on the town of Hajin,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. On Thursday, coalition raids killed another seven civilians in the nearby village of Al-Shaafa, Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman said.

Both Hajin and Al-Shaafa are in a last pocket under IS control in the eastern province of Deir Ezzor near the border with Iraq.

A coalition spokesman did not immediately reply for a request for comment.

The coalition has been backing a Kurdish-Arab alliance fighting the militants in the area.