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The former branch of al-Qaeda in Syria, Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), announced on November 10 that its special forces had attacked a position of the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) in the Turkman mount in the northern Lattakia countryside. The radical group claimed than ten Syrian soldiers were killed in the attack.
HTS and its news network Iba’a didn’t release additional information about the attack as they usually do. This allowed local observers to question the group’s claims.
Earlier, HTS claimed that its special forces had killed 18 personnel of the SAA and 7 Russian service members during an attack on an “operations room” in the northern Hama countryside. However, the Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) dismissed the group’s claims and said that the attack was a failure.
These attacks are a clear violation of the Russian-Turkish deconfliction agreement on the governorate of Idlib. Under the agreement, the opposition-held areas in northern Hama and northern Lattakia are considered to be a part of the demilitarized zone, where military operations are forbidden.
There is a ceasefire in place here, but you’d never know it.
These attacks serve as a provocation to get the SAA to cancel the ceasefire, upon which Al Nusra’s masters in the West can claim foul, order the White Helmets to restart operation Fake Chemical Attack again and unleash cruise missile spam attack again.
As it is Al Nusra has nothing to gain from the ceasefire. Yeah, Idlib gets spared for now, but in the long run it wants to rule all of Syria. In order to do that it has to restart the war again and get Western air support to do the dirty work for them.
SAA must break the cease fire if they want their lands back under the turks occupation.
I think Erdogan is going to abandon the south of Idlib as part of as deal with Putin, leaving most of the nut job militias to the mercy of the SAA and moving the rest north. He’ll then consolidate his loyal forces in the north of Idlib, and start moving the bulk of them east into first Aleppo, and then eventually even Ar-Raqqah and Al-Hasakah when the time is right. And as much as that sounds like a mad prediction, I’ll also make it even more unbelievable by adding this, I also think that Putin, Trump and Erdogan are all agreeable to this, and formulated the plan between them equally, though I don’t think the Iraqis or Assad are privy to the plan or agreeable to it if they are. If it happens it’ll happen soon, 2 to 4 weeks at most, so I won’t have long to find out how wrong or right I am about what I think’s about to happen.
Methinks Assad would rather have Eastern Syria back then Idlib. That at least is useful because its got oil and gas reserves. All Idlib seems to produce is food and nutjobs. Even by SF’s own admission the people of Idlib seem to be most favorable to headchopper ideology. I therefore think that any deal that partitions Syria up and gives some part to Turkey (indirectly of course through its proxy armies) would sooner see Turkey in command of Idlib then Eastern Syria. It would most definitely not be a good deal for Syria, that’s for sure. The only thing retaking Idlib is good for would be to give some buffer space between the city of Aleppo and Turkey and its headchopper proxies.
Poor old Assad is getting less and less say in what happens in his own country lately, and even worse still, he’s usually left in the dark about agreements until it’s too late to protest. the 4 big players Russia/US/Iran/Turkey have all the power now. Assad doesn’t have any oilfields or territory north of the Euphrates ATM, so if a deals done that allows him to take back 70% of all the oilfields and territory in the west currently under US control, but also at the same time allows Erdogan to move his forces out of southern Idlib [welfare state] into the rest of US controlled territory that isn’t returned to Assad, they both have a small win. Erdogan loses half the welfare state of Idlib he’s been paying for but can’t afford, and in return gets a few goldmines to pay for the whole enterprise he’s left with as a part of the deal, and Assad would get back most of the territory and revenue he’s lost, which is a lot better than nothing, so it’s a win win for all parties, especially Trump, and it’s only the Kurds that ever lose anything in this deal. Though they do gain some certainty now with this deal that they haven’t had since the Turkish incursion, they’ve realized they might not be able to count on the US to defend them against the Turks, [2 strikes by them now] so at least with Assad they’ll know he’ll definitely fight the Turks if push comes to shove, and they want to fight the Turks more than anything right now. Trump wants out of Syria and this could be his solution to pull out, he isn’t leaving the Kurds completely to Erdogan’s mercy, but instead palming them off back to Assad [which he’s hoping won’t destroy his legacy], and he’s still leaving a divided Syria which is in his, the US deep state’s, and Israel’s best interests, and the Iranians and Iraqis won’t have to worry about the Kurds either making every party concerned a little better off and no one completely unhappy. But I see this as only the first stage of a grand plan by the big players, I think the second stage will include a treacherous move by at least 2 of the parties concerned. Erdogan will never tolerate the Kurds and the Kurds will never tolerate him, this plan [I think I see in the making] is never really meant to work, just be a precursor to the second stage of something bigger. With just about everything both Putin and Trump have said and done over the last 4 months, nothing has made any real sense at all, there’s been too many contradictory statements and actions from Putin Trump and Erdogan, and too many half measures applied to fix existing problems, it only makes sense to me when I look at in the context of my imagined strategy/plan, that I think is playing out right now.