Syrian armed rebels claim to have entered Aleppo, the first time rebels have entered the country’s second largest city since government forces recaptured the city in 2016.
Rebel forces launched a surprise attack this week, capturing a number of villages and reigniting conflict that had been largely static for years.
The Syrian military said it was confronting a “major attack” launched by “terrorist organizations” armed with heavy weaponry and drones.
The rebel ‘Military Operations Command’, said earlier that they seized control of the Syrian government’s Military Scientific Research Center on the outskirts of Aleppo city after “intense clashes with the regime forces and Iranian militias.”
Earlier that day, an artillery shell struck Aleppo University’s student housing, killing four people, according to Syria’s state news agency, SANA, which blamed opposition factions for the attack. The spokesperson for the rebel groups Hassan Abdulghani refuted the accusations by the Syrian government media as “baseless lies.”
On Thursday, at least 15 civilians, including six children and two women, were killed, and 36 others were injured in airstrikes and shelling on rebel-held areas in Aleppo and Idlib countryside, according to the White Helmets, a volunteer rescue group. Iranian state media said that an Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Brigadier General Kioumars Pourhashemi was also killed in the city .
In a call with his Syrian counterpart to discuss the escalation, Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi accused the United States and Israel of the “reactivation” of the rebels, and “stressed the continued support” of Iran to the Syrian government and army.
The Kremlin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov called on the Syrian authorities to “quickly restore order in this area and restore constitutional order.” Both Iran and Russia are key allies to Syria.