This map provides a look at the possible scenario of De-Escalation Zone Operation in Syria’s Idlib province. On October 12, the Turkish Armed Forces (TAF) entered Idlib and seized villages on the contact line between Idlib militants and Kurdish militias in northern Aleppo. Now, they are fortifying their positions in the area.
Following this advance, the TAF will likely continue its operation with an aim to build a buffer zone in the border area. At the same time, the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) and its allies, backed by Russian forces, should establish control over the Hama-Aleppo highway.
However, this will be possible only in case if all goes under the de-escalation agreement zone plan. Most likely, the both sides will face fierce resistance from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (formerly Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda) in the Idlib countryside. At the same time, the TAF has much more chances to reach some kind of agreement with Hayat Tahrir al-Sham than the SAA has ever had.
Tensions between the TAF and the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces will also create additional problems for the Turkish side.
Click to see the full-size map
the zio lapdogs are positioning themselves for their own selfish needs
Which ones are the zio lapdogs?
Take a wild guess…
must be all except the russia led coalition
Yep you are right! All but russia supported peiple are zio nato lap dogs and we have the reports and videos to prove it!
All those who aren’t rabid islamist terrorists apparently.
Sure, because living democratically and peacefully is just so “selfish” isn’t it? I mean, why do that, when you can be enslaved by murderous islamic trash instead?
If true, then looks like the Syrian Civil War is winding down with Turkey owning a huge chunk of Syrian Land. They will probably call it “New Turco”
The American war against Syria is not a civil war , yet . Kurds could turn it into one if they fail to separate from the US controlled SDF . Turks and Americans have no ground that is theirs in Syria , they will leave .
There’s still long way to go, but we can see end of the tunnel and light there…
Aye Mate and a glorious light it be !
The problem with the Kurds and many of us regularly forget, is that the Kurds are no just one unified entity.
The Turks were invited in and maybe even welcomed, as long as they leave after their operations, it is good news for all.
I cannot (or hope) that the Turks don’t back stab the Syrians, Russians and Iranians, but if they do, may they reap what they sow.
PS The Yanks can F.O.
Well it was a back stab read comment of mine below.
Well Syrian FM has strongly condemned Turkey’s incursion into Idlib, says the aggression violates the Astana talks and demands the immediate withdrawal of TAF. This should get interesting now if Turkey refuses the other partners to the agreement can intervene against Turkey. They can show that Turkey is acting as a belligerent and have them expelled from the talks and future negotiations. This is Russian politicking at work in how to expose a belligerent nation , they needed an actual proof of a breach to invalidate them.
I have just read about it.
Personally I would have let the Turks crack on and clear ISIS and then maybe go after the baddy Kurds.
But it looks like Erdogan has yet again stitched someone up.
He will get what’s coming to him, he isn’t going to get out of the situation easily.
I doubt Turkey will “own” anything when the dust settles… not even the graves of their soldiers.
You don’t disappoint. When I come here to read I know I will get to read the stupidity of Kenethllindsy.
Thanks Santiago. It’s always a pleasure to deliver for my fans.
That means a war between Turkey and Syria. Erdogan would abuse (and has used) the situation in Syria for his personal advantage. But the problem is he is in trouble with Russia and USA, I doubt about it that he can achieve that.
No matter how erratic Turkey behaves, neither US or RF is willing to sacrifice relations with Turkey over Syria. Sad.
Well it seems Russia doesn’t share your sentiments nor does the US for that matter, Syria has ordered the Turks to withdraw immediately from Idlib as it was a breach of the Astana talks. Looks like Erdogan has hooped himself on this one any actions in the future will jeopardize their standings. They will be seen as a untrustworthy partner in agreements , was hoping Trump would bite on the JCPOA guess now he gives that onus to congress.
Ha. If you had been following me on Twitter or Discus, then you would know that I predicted Turkey would violate Astana weeks/months ago.
HA HA. Russians ,Syrians and Iranians counted on it as they now breached the agreement UN will look for another committed partner to the agreement Egypt or China ! You can figure out what’s going to happen at the next talks. ROFLMAO!
I don’t know… it’s not only about the relation with Turkey. Turkey gets more and more isolated and economical situation is like the early 2010s. The Turkish society is splitted also and Erdogan has broken the peace with PKK and tries to suppress other political groups…
Everybody knows Erdman could make peace with pkk at any time, but instead he is playing to the ultra nationalists. AKP lost the big cities for the first time during the referendum, so Erdogan is in trouble.
Actually it was pkk that broke the peace
what means actually? Since 2015 the turkish army has destroyed towns and villages in the south-east, for example Cizre.
Pkk has sneaked hundreds of armed men inside those towns, put out flags. Declared a rebel goverment. Built trenches… all done while there were peace. Turkey did what every other goverment would do: evacuate civilians and annhilated armed pkk suckers. Obviously you are misinformed or biased. What would your goverment do if a Turkish gang burn your flags, move in armed men from Turkey to ‘kreuzberg’ and declare that its their land and goverment now????
How do you know that? Which towns?
Sur,dicle,silopi,idil,derik I know that.. because i live in Turkey and see things with my own eyes, not from media. This was the situation before army moved in: (these images are not from syria but from Turkey, shared by pkk supporters in trenches) https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d65ce5350499cf43645fd2cdb61131c5367a22144d065f43c42f15f104b00cc8.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/58734ba6e339db02580c30063255bfd4c27a058e15916587a16aaf22427afff0.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5972544e1fbce060b34d774c5c2c139328feb48fd2ef96d7837ceacda0334d4e.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a8b0ca56a85f35c5e27f68aded49d106a133fac57cfb09a2a07438fda5e27fa5.jpg
Letting Turkey entering Idlib will have devastating effects for Syria. I don’t even understand why this is happening under an agreement which legitimates it… once the front with ISIS would have gone and Damascus countryside secured, HTS and A. Al Sham would have had no chance against SAA.
If this comes as a measure to counter the kurdish expansion than it’s still wrong because what kurds want is to make their place into Syria (which is right as long as they do not expand to much taking what is not theirs and find a right balance between what they do and what they are told to do) but for sure what Turkey wants is to destroy Syria as we know it today,
Problem is, the Kurds already showed their willingness to take advantage of the situation when they started land grabbing as the SAA is fighting ISIS. Maybe things would be different if the Kurds never over stepped their boundaries, and stopped trying to take Syrian oil. The minute they threatened the Syrian government with violence if they crossed the Euphrates and took oil fields, they showed they could not be trusted.
Yes, it is quite right.
Dirty kurds for defending themselves when islamists started attacking them as soon as SAA left kurds to the dogs.
Despicable the way they even started to win.
Gruesome that they protected some arab factions and started to formally cooperate mid 2014.
It makes one sick that that the rebranded cooperation, SDF, started liberating mixed arab kurd lands.
It became killing when the SDF, after taking the mixed areas, took on liberating the home of their first allies, Raqqah.
Seeing their neighbours getting liberated, many arabs fled from DeZ to the north, direction of Hassakah. There many joined SDF and started to urge the SDF to liberate their lands too.
Many did not want to live under SAA anymore. Refugees from DeZ, Mayadin, are fleeing in their tens of thousands towards Northern Syria, not towards Assad.
SAA was unable, or unwilling, to go to Raqqah and further. Once SDF started phase one of the advance on Raqqah, SAA tried to and was beaten back, defeated, by IS.
SAA only restarted after SDF was laying siege on Tabqah, not before.
SAA could have asked SDF any time to provide an escort for the SAA Hassakah garrison to advance towards the south. They did not ask, remained sitting on their behinds. Why?
And now DeZ is the fault of SDF?
In a way, you made two compliments to the SDF. Firstly by being worried enough to concoct your little fairytale and secondly by commenting on their ability to seize opportunities, ever a sign of good command, tactics and politics.
You forgot that the Kurds cooperate with Islamist groups in some area . You forgot that the Kurds attacked SAA in Aleppo with rebel groups in the early years of the war
SAA does that with ISIS
Pro kurdophyle comment pretty much, the refugees from Deir Ezor are fleeing to North because it is closer than Damascus or other parts, also less fighting there it seems, those cities are so close to each other, they probably have family there where they can stay at, nothing to do with having more love for kurds, lol, Saa was busy taking western Syria and securing it’s back before it could head out to east, it’s the kurds that have started making moves after Saa had victories and the tides were turned, kurds have started advancing on Deir Ezor and the fields only when saa managed to break the siege and not before that, kurds are after those oil fields not because they love arabs imho, ability to seize opportunities imho, they way they do it, even a 4 year old one can,
You see kurds through rose colored glasses.
dude is a scumbag cia or whatever troll
By “the Kurds” you actually mean the people of northern Syria (Arabs, Assyrians, Syriacs, Kurds, Yazidis and others). By “land grabbing” you actually refer to the land where those people live, which they’re liberating, and from which they’re rescuing their own families. The rest of your dribble is just racist garbage.
Well the Kurds never lived in Al-Raqqa nor Deir Ezzor, unless you know better.
Under Saladin, Kurds lived as far away as Egypt and Yemen, not just Ak-Raqqa and Deir Ezzor
Always obfuscating making sophisms and creating hate where ever you go why don’t you go troll on your other accounts.
You are just jealous as I only have one account, under a real name, with a real pic. On the other hand Mr. Terracotta Brick, you live in a fantasy world. Got something to hide? Don’t like my comments, block them. Stop trying to be the world police like the USA. Now be a nice boy and play along with the other kids. Caring is sharing.
OK, cheers for the info.
But you are talking about the SDF, that is only 1 part of the Kurds. It is much more complicated than that. A mixtures of religion and cultures.
The Turks don’t want to eliminate all the Kurds, mainly the PKK, who they now say, are the backbone of he SDF.
The Turks are working with the HTS on some basis.
To me, I am yet to see an article that defines all the different groups properly in the Syrian, US led war. So many splinter groups and new names I cannot keep up.
All I know is that I hope and pray Syria, Russia, Iran, Hezbollah eliminates all scum in Syria including the Yanks.
Yep.reason of lots of names is to confuse average joes and bored impressionable housewives in eu and n america.
Agreed; the names of ISIS is the funniest to me.
ISIL -> L= Levant which includes Israel, so we cannot have that.
ISIS = sounded like one of the Israeli intelligence services, so we cannot have that.
IS = Islamic state and that p1ssed off the Muslim allies of the US.
and then we end up with Daesh !!, whish Syria and Iraq called them all along.
It is pathetic, the whole damn Yank operation.
Have a nice weekend.
I agree with you totally.
you are so funny,Saa fighting isis :D you must be jokking.only Kurds Sdf was and still fighting isis,el nusra other land thieves while Assad was picking up his suitcase. ready to escape his country ; Kurds wanted join their land cantons but Saa close the betveen the cantons later let the turkgay preassure from north to Shahba.and what later guess of course Kurds have friends like America and coalition while assad having more like russia iran hizbullah…Sdf start to go south.if Kurds were wanting like you say oil fields they would not wait months to get oil fields like Tawrah,Sfahiyeh,Hanadie,Jarayed oil fields which is 5 or 10 km just far from Sdf areas.while erdogan is killing babies assad killing still killing everyday innocent civilians if you are not blind you can see Sdf rescuing civilians ,people.i suggest dont listen haters ,racist loser and liars ,all enemy of the Kurds must be sure like today hasdi shabi bitches attackin southern Kurdistan,if no Kurdish braveness isis had now capital Bagdad.no living shii in iraq maybe in Syria as well.please be realist atleast and not fishbrain dont forget last years.
Problem is, the Kurds already showed their willingness to take advantage of the situation when they started land grabbing as the SAA is fighting ISIS Ohh SAA did that as well
As could be expected, Turkey gave the de-escalation an anti SDF twist as soon as they participated. Imo that was their intent from the beginning.
As there are no agreements on withdrawal, any part de-escalated by Turkey will never be let go by Turkey. Just like Azaz. Likely name for the future : Syro Turkish de-escalation protectorate.
This will in a way give Northern Syria legitimacy. As there will soon be a new “Syrian government” in Azaz, under full Turkish control, it will soon also control the turco Idlib zone.
SDF has only to adapt its present project by naming itself the new government for the whole of Syria. Then there will be three Syrian governments. The old one under protection of Russia, the new ones under protection of Turkey respectively the US.
It is even possible that the three will unite in the future as a confederation. Wouldn’t that be an irony?
Why they should unite – this is war such thing as uniting doesnt exist . You fight until you win or lose
Syrian government is winning against terrorists. The SAA, NDF and their allied forces sacrifices for the Syrian nation and for their homeland will be remembered for ever.
This is the result of stipud russian politics in syria. When they took in february 2017 Nubl, Zahra northwest of aleppo, and kruds took several towns in afrin, the fsa was totally destroyed. people fleed, and the saa had to take the whola anadan plane (Anadan, Haritan, Kafr Hamra). So they were close east aleppo hermetically already one and half year ago. In taht time they controlled Al Eis, should take ICARDA (contol of hihgway west from aleppo) and the jihadists had no chance to attack west aleppo. saa was 6 km from al bab. could take it (if want), or/also deir hafir and the important airport between deir hafer and maskanah. so in march 2017 could be the lords of north aleppo. instead of this dart putin removed 70 planes :(( traitor, traitor, traitor! in that day i realized, russia has only pity dirty game in syria, and it is no friend, no serious partner of syrians.
Also in latakia had the saa momentum. was stzopped, too. should free the last km2-s of latakia and take Jish as Shugur. With lost of anadan plane and jish as shugr today in idlib were quite another situation.
Similar was in hama. They stopped the Akakir ofensive in south, morek, kafr zita in north.
The most ironic tragedy haoppened in daraa. After taking of Shaik Miskin, towns Ibta and Dael were day from surrender. There were negotiations, in dael was already two star flag (thursday). Putin stopped the syrian offensive, and fsa on saturday came in these toens, shoot pro assad people. until today thes two towns are in hands of jihadists and cut an important road. In that mementum, when fsaa was fleeing in daraa county, strategic city of Nawa should be taken. with this lost in daraa fsa were totally blocked. later, when isis took 70% of fsa positions in daraa, easily could take saa the rest + defeat isis pack.
these broken moentums destroyed the moral of saa soldiers. so, the russian bandits are the reason of problems. and yes, bandits! bacause putin agrees with division of syria, invited americans, turks. he is not big chass player, as think sum fantics, he is simply stupid low-level officer of fsb. nothing less, nothing more. dwarf player in international politics,.betrayed syria, betayed east-ukrainians. btw., east ukraina looks like raqqa, aleppo city. the people left, and the rest will give up resistence within some years. putin is pissing on russians, he needed only crime. also in syria he needs latakia, maybe damascus. the rest can die. of course, without euphrates and oil fields will die syrians also in western part. the reason of revolt was the fact, that the agricultural soil is decreasing due to climatic changes. without euphrates will be the problem several times worse. but the death of millions of syrins does not interest putin. and why should? russian politicians always ignored dying of millions of russians. why should care for another nations? :(
in two-three years the main slogan in amputated syria will be:
be damned, putin!
Thanks to Putin, Assad is still alive, and Putin wants Turkey as ally bcs its big country and is better to have good relations with them
asad is alive as putins puppet. russians do tha same thing as turkey.
It is easy for us to conjecture, but we don’t really know what happens behind the scenes…
Perhaps russia couldn’t keep up to that shock and awe strategy for much longer for economic or even logistic reasons, or Obama threatened to give terrorists sams and manpads.
Perhaps had the russians not given FSA/Nusra a chance it coudlk have sparked a major conflict, and that is on the interests of the United States.
There might be dozens of reasons for the russians to have acted like they did, some good, some selfish, some unavoidable…
Bottom of line is… we can only scratch the surface with the information we have.
putin makes the same politics what did commies. therefore he is loser, too.
Perhaps russia couldn’t keep up to that shock and awe strategy for much longer for economic …
may be. but in that case russia is extremly week.
… or even logistic reasons, or Obama threatened to give terrorists sams and manpads.
than is militarily and politically weak. plus coward.
in bvoh case he should tell crystalclearly, russia is not abke and will not fight for united syria.
Russia is not weak, it’s just giving you time to see your own wrongdoings and start acting the right way.
welcom, first moron! you got the clay-donkey prize.
You work with clay now ? This is so typical, when trolls run out of arguments they start to troll :) Go on, old troll.
If we are talking abouth sheer force is it pretty clear NATO is the stronger party worldwide, so of course russians will avoid direct confrontation, like I said, open large scale conflict in eurasia is not in the interest of Russia.
Russia is playing a resistence game, as the western empire is slowly crumbling under its own weight, even if the empire tis able to throw a punch some times russians would be pretty stupid to go heads on against NATO, they will continue to dodge and hit when they see an opening until the overweight west fall due to his own obesity.
Moreover, have you thought that perhaps russians really thought about all possibilities and came to the conclusion they were not strong enough to keep Syria united?
If you can’t do something, you just can’t, and it’s up to syrians to fight for their country, Russia has done A LOT for them already, they have lost 2 russian generals on this war.
At last, this war is still unfolding, I hope and pray that syrians keep their country united, but only future will tell.
do you have such e-mail, where we could discuss? for better chenge of opinions both of us need write longer answers. not always is time, and the e-mail will not disappear, can wait. you can also create one neutral mail for communication only.
I’m not a fan of e-mail, I stay months without logging on them, for me it’s pretty mostly for shopping stuff, family and official matters.
You can look me up on Facebook, I use the same name there.
Oh my what a rant, you quite a medieval way of thinking,hand them all, kill them, bla bla bla, what Putin is doing is reconciliation, those people have to learn live with each other, for Syrians it is better to stop fighting each other and start working with each other, sure there are foreighn forces but they wouldn’t be able to stay there if the locals weren’t supporting them, there are also many Syrians among them, it’s better to safe those people through reconciliation, it’s not going to happen in few days, it’s going to take years but it’s better this way, we have all seen the results of the western coalition in Iraq and other places, if you suppress one group it will get out of control when the foreign forces aren’t in the country anymore. To put it your way, Putin is smart you are stupid.
some facts perhaps, little commie?
Those are facts you medieval old bafoon, reconciliation zones, talks with opposition, talks and deals with surrounding countries. He’s doing the right thing, you can’t destroy everyone imho, they would just recruit new jihadists and send them over to Syria, there are plenty of poor countries around where you can get your cannon fodder, when the Syrians will stop fighting among themselves they can form a strong front against unwanted foreigners. And don’t start about ukraine, you don’t even know a thing about it imho.
you never wrote any facts, russian commie liar! :DDD you are so big tragedy as the last tdays of soviet union :DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD
I suspect that you do not possess the ability to read or simply don’t want to, there you go ranting again, another confirmation that i was right about you, trolly.
So when will the Syrians stop fighting among themselves?
probably when foreign powers will stop encourage them with money , weapons and ideology
Sorry, I’ll rephrase that question. When will humanity stop fighting amongst themselves?
Multipolar world based on international law not like it is now, where one side tries to control it all, we can keep on philosophizing about this forever, how to get rid off all diseases and make the people the people live forever young and happy but the “short-term” solution for Syria and the whole ME is that what i have mentioned in my previous comment.
This De-escalation Zone seems to neuter Kurdish/FSA plans, which can only mean Yanks have decided on another tactic to undermine SAA and it’s allies. Can’t see Daesh and Jabaht al Nusra cooperation, more likely to see FSA/SAF realignment with JaN, re-branded as HAT but still under the control of the Sunni Wahhabist, Abu Mohammed al-Julani. I smell the stink of treachery. Nothing is as it seems. SAA and its allies have to stay ever vigilant.
When is the next Syrian national elections? Depending upon the integrity of UN personnel, and thorough verification of citizen/voter records, might include a couple of referendum questions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0U503h7UwWE
Putin’s best friend Erdogan fool’s Putin and Russian colleagues USA,France and Israel fool’s Russia.