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On October 3, Syrian government forces renewed push towards the ISIS stronghold of Mayadin located southeast of Deir Ezzor city.
According to pro-government sources, the Syrian Arab Army (SAA), the National Defense Forces (NDF) advanced on the both banks of the Euphrates River engaging ISIS units near Jadeed Ekedat and al-Muhassan.
If government troops are able to seize any of these two villages, this will be a major breaktrough for the Syrian military that has recently faced signfificant problems with the ISIS resistance in central Syria.
The SAA-led advance on the eastern bank of the Euphrates will for sure draw attention of the US-led coalition and to push the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces to restore their efforts to seize the strategic Omar oil fields before government forces.
SAA and allies should take Jadeed Ekedat and al-Muhassan and move south on both banks of the Eufrates, SDF is already stretched thin and is not in position to to race along with SAA and allies, with front lines along M20 stabilizing, the concentrated effort to annihilate ISIS on both sides of Eufrates will gain momentum.
Might I suggest that IS advances southeastward instead of southward. Otherwise they will either run into the river or into the desert.
SDF does not have to race along the SAA as they are already beyond the SAA as in more to both the east and southeast, as far as east of the river is concerned.
As SDF is already east of the Khabur river at Suhwar and advancing south from there, they can, if racing is necessary, just cross the empty desert towards Omar oilfields, without any obstacles other than the terrain.
SDF is stretched, no doubt, just as SAA is stretched too, as many commenters here state when confronted with the not so excellent performance of SAA this last week.
All this “racing” just makes for possible conflicts between SAA and SDF, which might just be one of the objectives of IS.
A conflict with the Syrian government forces has already been initiated by the US/Zionist slaves the SDF. They already twice challenged the authority of the sole legitimate and democratically elected Syrian government and its jurisdiction over its own sovereign territory and resources by threatening to attack the Syrian government troops if they dare cross the Euphrates river. This illegal seditious US slave group also declared that they intend to invade and steal all the territory and oil and gas resources on the Eastern banks of the Euphrates river and that the sole legitimate and democratically elected Syrian government will have no place in the Zio/Nazi/US invaded and occupied areas. They also added insult to injury by publicly stating that they would provide the illegal foreign Western colonial imperialist invaders and occupiers of Syrian land ‘military bases for decades to come’. This is a declaration of war against a UN member state by an illegal foreign invasion force and Syria has no other option than to take on the challenge to assert its sovereignty and legitimate authority over all of its land and eject the invaders from there, if need be even by force.
I always have fun when I read “democratically elected Syrian government”.
Commenters here “forget” that the official philosophy of Syria is Ba’thism.
An ethnic arab hardcore socialist regime on the lines of Stalinism, partly mutated into an alawite family dictatorship.
In Iraq, under Saddam, their Ba’thism was mutated into HIS family dictatorship, based upon the Tikrit sunni arabs.
Legal?
What’s in a name, right?
Dutch, we make the mistake of judging other democracies by our own experience. These societies tend to be more clannish and sectarian, and require a strong central government to keep the peace. Look at Libya and Iraq once the strongman’s boot is off, they explode in every direction.
We should not be so quick to judge, they know their societies far better than we do. If they accept a ‘dictatorship’, then that is a form of democracy. It is not our job to impose our vision of what that should be, especially when that would tear their societies apart.
I always laugh at people who live in a monarchy who think it’s ok to have them run their lives you are trained I guess. Seems you never experienced a real democracy ever, yet you act hypocritically to all different forms of democracy and actually treat it like “Demockery” typical of sneering autocrats.
@dutchnational It is still legal and recognised by the U.N. as a sovereign State with Assad as the president .. you cannot change that … as to Democracy … well thats really a relative term isn’t it ..? You may be shocked to hear this but for whatever reason … Assad actually do have a lot of support from the population …. even more than some of the democratic leaders …
Angela Merkel party only got 33.2 percent at the last election .. almost 70 percent of the voters in Germany did not want her … yet she still governs … and that is Democracy !
The SDF is the one making overtures of declarations of war not the SAA , heard the US is currently looking for away to extricate themselves from this mess Syria and Iraq. Think with the US egging the SDF to make threats might be the way for them to leave the region. The US will end up like Russia calling it won soon and will declare mop up operations and state that the climate is unstable due to Kurds trying to claim independence. They then would claim wasting US lives in civil matters is not what they are there to do as these are messy situations then emphasize ISIS as being first needed to be defeated.They then will claim this situation has become untenable then they will withdraw all their troops and equipment.
@terra_cotta_woolpuller:disqus … I think US commanders on the ground have been telling porkies to the YPG … making them believe that YPG will soon have their own nation … I think that is why YPG is now so suddenly opposing SAA …. coming all the way down to try and take those oilfields and deny SAA to reach the border with Iraq … US wants the YPG to take all those Oilfields so that Syria will forever be weak and also to partition those eastern side of the country so that Iran cannot reach Iraq border … to curtail Iran influence and activities further in Iraq and Syria …
BUT US have already stated on the record that Kurds in Iraq cannot secede and that US will not recognise the referendum nor an independent Kurdistan as the region is too unstable …
So …. I really think that eventually US will bow to Turkey pressure and withdraw from lower eastern areas at least as US had to get permission from Turkey so that they could use YPG to attack Raqqah …
Ominous signs are there for YPG to see and they will need to decide what they will really get out from US … They were so reliant on Russian air power before .. they were co-operating with SAA … so I guess we will see …
Avi is worried that all the chickens are coming home to roost and the US hasn’t bargained on any of this happening and they are being pushed into a corner. The problem is Barzani has been along with other officials have been robbing the KRG blind and not paying salaries and everything else among other things. Why he pushed for the referendum to distract the politicians an people and make an escape soon. The only parties that want to negotiate are the ones who stole the money.
China is coming into this conflict in the Middle east and will negotiate to build a base or two there.
SDF by having a few Humvees and a few dozen fighters in specific location cannot be serious in claiming all that territory marked in yellow. SAA and allies have far greater resources in men and equipment and can outnumber SDF and the US SOF by a great margin in any eventual showdown.
You keep harping about the bad week SAA had, how about being objective and seeing how bad of a week ISIS had? ISIS attacked several spots along the M20 highway, they had the element of surprise and then they got creamed the same way HTS got creamed in Idlib.
Easier said than Done.
They already are moving along both banks already and are moving in a wider pattern on the South to cover the flank in the desert.
Let’s hope they succeed. Obviously events now across Syrian fronts don’t allow to believe that much could be achieved in that front.
They have 3 bridges built I believe now, one people weren’t sure of the location with a capacity for 70,000 vehicles a day and another was being started elsewhere.
it is great to know that the russian led coalition are liberating villagers from the zio satanic terrorists instead of grabbing on oil fields which will eventually be syrians’ sooner or later …. playing dirty, greedy and full of fakery will be from the one and only illegitimate yankee coalition
Interesting.
We will see what happens the next few days.
If ISIS and SDF aren’t locked in combat as Russia alleges then SDF would have advanced to the Omar gas and oil fields already. The Russian claims don’t add up.
Surely the USA, will order ISIS to make a strong resistance to the Syrian army, while they seize the oil fields. as it is known, the FSA and ISIS, are children of the American government.
we wish you success in this campaign to liberate the government of Deir ez Zor.
Strategically speaking, this push should be complemented by a lightning advance further South, near the T2 Pumping Station along the Iraqi border towards the Al Bukamal border crossing. This would serve two vital purposes. Block any ISIS infiltration from Iraq and start an advance on both sides of the Euphrates river towards the North to link up to the Syrian government forces advancing Southwards towards Al Mayadin and enclose the ISIS terrorists in the Homs-Deir Ezzur desert area. Whoever arrives first can secure the Omar fields.
Looks like SDF will be first at Omar fields.
Time will tell.
Reports from SDF in this last week prove to be more accurate then those of SAA and Ru MOD.
Which SDF sources are you following ? Thank you.
Rather a lot. Anhar and twitter accounts.
some like #sdf #rojava
and more official accounts and then follow the threads.
For more reflective news and more impartial, I like Al Monitor.
If one follows http://www.newsnow.co.uk for worldnews/asia/kurdestan, one gets a whole lot of daily links to international press releases on the subject.
@deocass:disqus I wonder if Iraqi PMUs would cross the border and make a MAD dash and take those Oil fields and hold onto it till SAA arrives .. ? No doubt Iraqi PMU would face ISIS … but they would be more likely looking inwards waiting for SAA … LoL … But its a bit too late to plan that … US will probably try and bomb them … …just a thought …
Breaking : according to SDF related accounts, Kasham has been taken late this morning, early afternoon by SDF from IS.
This negates the SF report that SAA is advancing east of the river as Kasham is in the map reported as under SAA.
IF the report is correct, then the SF report, based upon pro SAA sources, has not been veryfied sufficiently.
Hopefully we learn tomorrow who is correct.
In case the advance on the east side of the river is fake news, might then the advance on the south side also be fake news?
We will hear more from SF in the near future.
This is a smart move. The Kurds are not going to advance into ISIS territory much further because they have not paid off ISIS East of the Khabur river, as they did for their easy drive down to Deir Ez Zor City. Thus, they are facing resistance.
It took them months with secret US Special Forces camps to recruit ISIS North of Deir Ez Zor. Now, they are facing new ISIS units not part of that bargain.
By the way, the Khabur river is really just a creek that anyone can wade across.
The problem with advancing down the West bank of the Euphrates is that the SAA will eventually have to cross back over the Euphrates again to get to the Omar oil fields. There are obviously less ISIS on the East side of the Euphrates and they don’t have a bridge either to get back over there to protect the Omar field.
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