BEIRUT: Turkish forces and their rebel allies have entered Syria's Kurdish-majority city of Afrin and taken control of several districts, a war monitor said on Sunday.
"Fighting is ongoing inside the city, where Turkish forces and allied rebels have seized some neighbourhoods," the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said.
Pro-Ankara Syrian rebels said they "broke into the city from the eastern and western sides" to seize the neighbourhoods of Ashrafieh and Jamiliyyeh.
Civilians hiding in basements inside the city could hear fighting outside and people shouting "God is greatest", one resident told AFP.
Turkish-led forces have advanced rapidly into the Kurdish enclave around Afrin city near the Turkish border since launching an assault on it almost two months ago.
They are fighting the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia, which Ankara considers a "terrorist" offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
But the Kurdish militia has also formed the backbone of an American-backed alliance that has expelled the Islamic State jihadist group from large parts of Syria.
More than 1,500 Kurdish fighters have been killed in a two-month assault by Turkish forces and allied Syrian rebels on the Kurdish enclave of Afrin, a monitor said Sunday.
Most of them were killed air strikes and artillery fire, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said.
More than 400 pro-Ankara rebels had been killed since January 20, the Observatory said.
Meanwhile the Observatory says more than 280 civilians have been killed in the offensive since January 20, but Ankara denies the reports and says it takes the "utmost care" to avoid civilian casualties.
More than 200,000 civilians have fled Afrin city in the past three days, the Observatory says.
Turkey-led forces enter Syria's Afrin city: monitor
Turkey-led forces enter Syria's Afrin city: monitor
Syria sends thousands of troops to Lebanon border, sources say
- The Syrian officers said the Syrian reinforcement operation began in February but sped up in recent days
- The reinforcements include infantry units, armored vehicles and short-range Grad and Katyusha rocket launchers
DAMASCUS/BEIRUT: Syria has reinforced its border with Lebanon with rocket units and thousands of troops, eight Syrian and Lebanese sources said on Tuesday, as conflict spread in the region including between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The sources included five Syrian military officers, a Syrian security official and two Lebanese security officials who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The Syrian officers said the Syrian reinforcement operation began in February but sped up in recent days. The Syrian and Lebanese armed forces did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The Syrian officers, including a senior member of the military, said the move was aimed at preventing arms and drugs smuggling as well blocking Iran-backed Lebanese Hezbollah or other militants from infiltrating Syria.
A Syrian officer told Reuters that military formations from several Syrian army divisions, including the 52nd and 84th Divisions, have expanded their presence along the border in western Homs countryside and south of Tartus.
The reinforcements include infantry units, armored vehicles and short-range Grad and Katyusha rocket launchers, the official said.
The Syrian security official said Damascus had no plans for military action against any neighboring country. “But Syria is prepared to deal with any security threat to itself or its partners,” he said.
Still, the move has fueled concern among some European and Lebanese officials over a possible incursion.
The Syrian military officers vehemently denied any such plans, saying Syria wants balanced relations with its neighbor after decades of strained ties linked to Syria’s outsized influence in Lebanon and Hezbollah’s support for the former government of Syrian President Bashar Assad during a 14-year civil war.
Syria had troops stationed in Lebanon from 1976 until 2005 including during Lebanon’s civil war that ended in 1990.
Hezbollah resumed firing at Israel on Monday more than a year after reaching a ceasefire to a months-long war in 2024. Since that ceasefire, Israel continued near-daily strikes.
Israel this week ordered much of Lebanon’s south evacuated, with tens of thousands of people displaced. Israeli airstrikes across Lebanon’s South and southern Beirut have killed dozens and prompted thousands of people to flee toward Syria.
A senior Lebanese security official said Syrian authorities told Beirut that Syria’s deployment of rocket launchers along the mountains that form Lebanon’s eastern border with Syria was a “defensive measure against any action or attack that Hezbollah might launch against Syria.”
