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Hama is strategically located in central Syria and was crucial for the Army to secure the capital and seat of power in Damascus.
Syrian rebels cheer as they take control of the key city of Hama on Thursday. (AFP)
Syrian rebels captured the key city of Hama on Thursday in a major victory for the week-old lightning offensive in northern Syria launched by the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) and dealing a devastating blow to President Bashar Al-Assad and his Army.
The Syrian Army on Thursday acknowledged that it had lost control of Hama for the first time since a civil war gripped the embattled country in 2011. “Over the past few hours, with the intensification of confrontations between our soldiers and terrorist groups… these groups were able to breach a number of axes in the city and entered it,” it said in a statement.
The Army said it was redeploying outside the city “to preserve civilian lives and prevent urban combat” after intense clashes with Islamist rebels, who were seen parading through Hama into the evening and freeing detainees from the city prison amid celebratory gunfire.
Before this, the rebels had never managed to seize Hama, which is strategically located in central Syria and was crucial for the Army to secure the capital and seat of power in Damascus. The fall of Hama is a major blow to President Assad’s forces and his Russian and Iranian allies.
How Hama Fell To Syrian Rebels?
The fighting around Hama follows a lightning offensive by Islamist-led rebels who in a matter of days wrested swathes of territory from President Bashar al-Assad’s grasp. Last week, the rebels seized Aleppo, Syria’s second city, where Assad’s government had ruled after a Russia-aided victory in 2016.
Rebel forces reached the gates of Hama city on Tuesday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor, and the fighting sparked a wave of displacement. Government forces launched a counterattack, but the rebels stormed Hama from several sides and engaged in street battles with the Army, according to the Observatory.
After the armed forces withdrew, the rebels announced “the complete liberation” of Hama on their Telegram channel, kissed the ground and let off celebratory fire. Many residents turned out to welcome the rebel fighters. A photographer of news agency AFP saw some residents set fire to Assad’s poster near the city hall.
Aron Lund, a fellow of the Century International think tank, called the loss of Hama “a massive, massive blow to the Syrian government” because the army should have had an advantage there to reverse rebel gains “and they couldn’t do it”.
ALSO READ: Why Has The Syrian War Got Reignited? Who Are The Rebels That Took Aleppo? Explained
What Happens Next?
In a video posted online, HTS leader Mohammad al-Jolani said his fighters had entered Hama to “cleanse the wound that has endured in Syria for 40 years”, referring to a massacre of rebels by the armed forces controlled by Assad’s father that killed tens of thousands in the 1980s, and congratulated the people on their “victory”.
The Islamist rebels said they were ready to push towards the city of Homs, which is a key link between the capital Damascus and the Alawite heartland that lies just 40 km south of Hama. “Your time has come,” said a rebel operations room in an online post, calling on residents to take up arms.
“Assad now cannot afford to lose anything else. The big battle is the one coming against Homs. If Homs falls, we are talking of a potential change of regime,” said Jihad Yazigi, editor of the Syria Report newsletter.
The British-based Observatory said tens of thousands of Assad’s minority community, an offshoot of Shiite Muslims, were fleeing Homs as the rebels kept up their advance. “We are afraid and worried that what happened in Hama will be repeated in Homs,” a civil servant told AFP. “We fear they (the rebels) will take revenge on us.”
The Observatory said 826 people, including 222 in Hama, had been killed since violence erupted last week. The attack was the fiercest rebel offensive in Syria in years after a civil war engulfed the country in 2011. UN chief Antonio Guterres said the fighting reflects “the bitter fruits of a chronic collective
failure of previous de-escalation arrangements”.
(with inputs from agencies)
- Location :
Damascus, Syria