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Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Rebels Seize Most of Army Base in North Syria
2013-02-14
[An Nahar] Syrian rebels took control of most of a strategic army base in northern Syria after a fierce firefight with Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad's
Horror of Homs...
forces on Wednesday, a monitoring group said.

The military complex, known as Base 80, is tasked with securing the nearby Aleppo international airport as well as the Nayrab military airport.

Rebels launched a coordinated assault on both airports on Tuesday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which added that most of Base 80 "has come under hard boy control".

Dozens of fighters and troops have been killed in the fighting, the Britannia-based Observatory said.

Activists have said Aleppo's beturbanned goons shifted their focus from targets in the quiet provincial capital to air bases because they are a source of ammunition and weaponry, and to put out of action warplanes used to bomb rebel bastions.

In Aleppo city itself, meanwhile, electricity or water supplies were down on Wednesday for a fourth day in a row, said the anti-regime Aleppo Media Center, warning of a "humanitarian disaster" in what was once Syria's commercial hub.

Commenting on the rebels' advance in Aleppo province, Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said the army may be giving up on parts of northern Syria in order to secure the center.

"The army is barely resisting the rebels' advance on bases in the north. Meanwhile,
...back at the revival hall, Buford bit the snake and Eloise began speaking in tongues...
it is resisting with ferocity the beturbanned goons in Daraya (southwest of Damascus
...The capital of Iran's Syrian satrapy...
) and Homs (central Syria)," Abdel Rahman told Agence La Belle France Presse.

"The regime understands it cannot survive a transition without securing some land to bargain with," he added.

Despite the advances, regime warplanes carried out several air raids on rebel areas in Aleppo province on Wednesday while army tanks shelled the east Damascus district of Jobar, the Observatory said.

At least eight non-combatants were killed in Jobar, it said.

Insurgents have secured enclaves in the eastern and southern suburbs of Damascus, and the army is trying hard to push them out, the watchdog said.

On the eastern and western edges of the central city of Homs, rebels clashed with troops on two main highways, a rebel commander said.

Arraba Idriss told AFP via Skype that the beturbanned goons are trying to "ease the pressure on people trapped in districts that have been besieged and bombarded" for some eight months by the army.

At least 121 people were killed in violence across Syria on Wednesday, half of them civilians, the Observatory said.
Posted by:Fred

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