The Syrian army said on Saturday that dozens of its soldiers had been killed in a major attack by rebels who swept into the city of Aleppo, forcing the army to redeploy in the biggest challenge to President Bashar al-Assad in years.
The surprise attack, led by the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, was the boldest rebel assault in years in the civil war, where frontlines had largely been frozen since 2020.
Russia’s defense ministry said its air force carried out strikes on rebels in support of Assad’s army after the attack, Russian news agencies reported.
A spokesperson for the US State Department said earlier that the United States was “monitoring the situation.”
The war, which has killed hundreds of thousands of people and displaced many millions, has ground on since 2011 with no formal end, although most major fighting halted years ago after Iran and Russia helped Assad’s government win control of most land and all major cities.
Aleppo had been firmly held by the government since the 2016 victory there, one of the war’s major turning points, when Russian-backed Syrian forces besieged and laid waste to rebel-held eastern areas of what had been the country’s largest city.
“I am a son of Aleppo and was displaced from it eight years ago, in 2016. Thank God we just returned. It is an indescribable feeling,” said Ali Jumaa, a rebel fighter, in television footage filmed inside the city.
Acknowledging the rebel advance, the Syrian army command said insurgents had entered large parts of Aleppo.
After the army said it was preparing a counterattack, airstrikes targeted rebel gatherings and convoys in the city, the pro-Damascus newspaper al-Watan reported. One strike caused casualties in Aleppo’s Basel Square, a resident told Reuters.
Overnight, images from Aleppo showed a group of rebel fighters gathered in the city’s Saadallah al-Jabiri Square, a billboard of Assad looming behind them.
Images filmed on Saturday showed people posing for photos on a toppled statue of Bassel al-Assad, the late brother of the president. Fighters zipped around the city in flatbed trucks and milled around in the streets. A man waved a Syrian opposition flag as he stood near Aleppo’s historic citadel.
The Syrian military command said militants had attacked in large numbers and from multiple directions, prompting “our armed forces to carry out a redeployment operation aimed at strengthening the defense lines in order to absorb the attack and preserve the lives of civilians and soldiers.”
Rebels took control of Aleppo’s Airport
The rebels also took control of Aleppo Airport, according to a statement by their operations room and a security source.
Two rebel sources also said the insurgents had captured the city of Maarat al-Numan in Idlib province, bringing all of that area under their control.
Israeli intelligence officials were set to brief Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday night on the developments in Syria and the potential domino effect these events could trigger across the Middle East.
One scenario under consideration involves Hezbollah moving forces and weaponry from Lebanon to Syria to bolster the Assad regime. Iran and Russia are already providing support to the Syrian military, and there is also the possibility that the Houthis may join in assisting Assad.
Another concern is Iran’s potential transfer of weapons into Syria to support the war effort. These arms could later reach Lebanon, where Hezbollah might use them to rebuild its military capabilities, according to Israeli assessments.
The IDF has stated it will respond aggressively to any attempts to smuggle weapons into Lebanon. The prime minister also warned this week that Assad is “playing with fire,” citing the terror infrastructure he allows to operate within his territory, weapons manufacturing, and the smuggling of arms from Syria to Lebanon.”
Israel’s defense establishment is closely monitoring the diverse rebel factions in Syria. Some groups, such as Jabhat al-Nusra, are part of the global jihad movement, while others are backed by Turkey or Ukraine or consist of Syrian civilians. Israel is determined to ensure that none of these factions exploit the situation to act against Israeli interests.
With Assad backed by Russia and Iran, and Turkey supporting some of the rebels in the northwest where it maintains troops, the offensive has brought into focus the conflict’s knotted geopolitics. Fighting in the northwest had largely abated since Turkey and Russia reached a de-escalation agreement in 2020.
The foreign ministers of Iran and Russia voiced support for Syria on Saturday. Iran’s Abbas Araghchi told Russia’s Sergei Lavrov in a phone call that the attacks were part of an Israeli-US plan to destabilize the region, state media said.
According to a statement from the Russian Foreign Ministry about the call, both sides “expressed extreme concern about the dangerous escalation of the situation in Syria due to the terrorist offensive by armed groups in the Aleppo and Idlib provinces.”
The ministers agreed on the need to intensify joint efforts aimed at stabilizing the situation in Syria.
Lavrov also held a phone call with his Turkish counterpart, Hakan Fidan, discussing the situation in Syria, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Saturday.
“Both sides expressed serious concerns at the dangerous development of the situation,” the ministry said. They agreed that it was necessary to coordinate joint actions to stabilize the situation in the country.
Syrian Civil Defense, a rescue service operating in opposition-held parts of Syria, said in a post on X/Twitter that the Syrian government and Russian aircraft carried out airstrikes on residential neighborhoods in rebel-held Idlib, killing four civilians and wounding six others.
Two Syrian military sources said Moscow has promised Damascus extra military aid that would start arriving in the next 72 hours.
The Kurdish People’s Defense Units (YPG), which spearhead the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces that control much of northeastern and eastern Syria and have long had a foothold in Aleppo, widened their control in the city as government troops left, a senior YPG source said.
Mustafa Abdul Jaber, a commander in the Jaysh al-Izza rebel brigade, said the rebels’ speedy advance had been helped by a lack of Iran-backed manpower to support the government in the broader Aleppo province.
Iran’s allies in the region have suffered a series of blows at the hands of Israel as the war in Gaza has expanded through the Middle East.
The opposition fighters have said the campaign was in response to stepped-up strikes in recent weeks against civilians by the Russian and Syrian air forces on areas of Idlib province and to preempt any attacks by the Syrian army.
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