Syrian rebels enter Syria's second largest city of Aleppo for the first time since 2016

Syrian rebels went on a large-scale offensive on Aleppo on Wednesday, November 27. On November 29, they entered western and central parts of the city. Russian Aerospace Forces support government troops in the fighting.

Photo: commons.wikimedia.org by Vyacheslav Argenberg, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Aleppo, Syria

Rebel forces entered Aleppo, Syria's second-largest city, for the first time since 2016, Anadolu news agency reports citing sources and monitoring groups.

Aleppo is located in northern Syria, near the border with Turkey. Damascus, located in the south, is about 350 km away from the city.

The rebels broke through to the western outskirts of the city where they clashed with government troops. Residents are leaving these areas amid rocket attacks and gunfire.

According to Anadolu, opposition forces have reached the center of Aleppo from the west of the city. Over 10,000 residents fled to Idlib province south of Aleppo.

Syrian rebels published videos of their troops entering the city on Telegram. They called on the residents of Aleppo to cooperate with them.

Opposition forces have taken control of 400 square kilometers of territory, 70 settlements and strategically important facilities, Anadolu reports.

Syrian rebels embarked on their major offensive on Aleppo on Wednesday. The opposition forces are represented by the Free Syrian Army, which was supported by the United States and Turkey (Russia and Iran are on the side of the government forces), and Islamist groups, including terrorist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS, banned in Russia). Their unified command is called Al-Fatah al-Mubin.

The militants claim that they launched the offensive in response to "an increase in the number of Russian and Syrian strikes on civilians in areas south of Idlib."

Representatives for the Syrian Armed Forces said that they were showing resistance to terrorists as militants were suffering heavy losses in equipment and manpower. The Russian Center for Reconciliation of Opposing Sides in Syria reported that the Russian Aerospace Forces were supporting government forces in the fight against the militants.

At least 135 anti-government fighters, 83 Syrian military personnel and 20 civilians were killed in three days of clashes. Four people were killed in the shelling of the campus of the University of Aleppo. More than 14,000 people were forced to flee their homes, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said.

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The Syrian civil war is an ongoing multi-sided conflict in Syria involving various state-sponsored and non-state actors. In March 2011, popular discontent with the rule of Bashar al-Assad triggered large-scale protests and pro-democracy rallies across Syria, as part of the wider Arab Spring protests in the region. After months of crackdown by the government's security apparatus, various armed rebel groups such as the Free Syrian Army began forming across the country, marking the beginning of the Syrian insurgency. By mid-2012, the crisis had escalated into a full-blown civil war. Rebel forces, receiving arms from NATO and Gulf Cooperation Council states, initially made significant advances against the government forces, who were receiving arms from Iran and Russia. Rebels captured the regional capitals of Raqqa in 2013 and Idlib in 2015. Consequently, Russia launched a military intervention in support of the government in September 2015, shifting the balance of the conflict. By late 2018, all rebel strongholds except parts of Idlib region had fallen to the government forces.