"Jihadist factions led by Hurras al-Deen
...the current incarnation of non-Syrian Al Qaeda in Syria...
launched an assault on two villages in Sahl al-Ghab," a region of the central province of Hama, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.They briefly seized the villages of al-Fatatra and al-Manara, Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman said.
But regime forces took them back just hours later amid Russian air strikes and intense shelling, the Britannia-based monitor said.
Abdel Rahman said the festivities left 19 government soldiers and 22 jihadists dead.
The country's official SANA news agency also reported the attack on "two Syrian army positions," saying it involved "explosive-rigged vehicles and jacket wallahs".
Citing a military source, it said the situation was now under control after the jihadists were forced to pull out under regime fire.
The offensive was launched from within the Idlib region, which is controlled by jihadists and rebels and is the last bastion of resistance to Damascus after nine years of devastating civil war.
A truce reached on March 6 has largely stemmed fighting in the region, which Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir
Pencilneckal-Assad
Oppressor of the Syrians and the Lebs...
has vowed to fully retake.
Hurras al-Deen is a relatively small but powerful gang led by al-Qaeda loyalists.
It is a rival of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, formerly al-Nusra, before that it was called something else
...al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate, from which sprang the Islamic State...
, an alliance of Islamist factions dominated by former members of al-Qaeda's ex-Syria affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra
...formally Jabhat an-Nusrah li-Ahli al-Sham (Support Front for the People of the Levant), also known as al-Qaeda in the Levant. They aim to establish a pan-Arab caliphate. Not the same one as the Islamic State, though .. ...
-- although the two groups cooperate at times.
The Idlib truce brokered by regime ally Russia and rebel backer
...Qatar's satrapy in Asia Minor...
has largely kept Syrian and Russian warplanes out of the region's skies.
The calm came as the novel coronavirus (aka COVID19 or Chinese Plague)
...the twenty first century equivalent of bubonic plague, only instead of killing off a third of the population of Europe it kills 3.4 percent of those who notice they have it. It seems to be fond of the elderly, especially Iranian politicians and holy men...pandemic spread across the Middle East.
Aid groups had warned that an outbreak of the COVID-19 illness in the Idlib region could cause a humanitarian disaster of previously unseen proportions.
Related:
Hurras al-Deen: 2020-06-05 Syrian warplanes unleash heavy overnight attack on Turkestan Islamic Party
Hurras al-Deen: 2020-06-04 Russian, Syrian warplanes strike foreign jihadists in Hama, Latakia
Hurras al-Deen: 2020-05-28 Russian jets swarm western Idlib as Syrian Army troops strike jihadist positions
Hurras al-Deen: 2020-06-05 Syrian warplanes unleash heavy overnight attack on Turkestan Islamic Party
Hurras al-Deen: 2020-06-04 Russian, Syrian warplanes strike foreign jihadists in Hama, Latakia
Hurras al-Deen: 2020-05-28 Russian jets swarm western Idlib as Syrian Army troops strike jihadist positions
Related:
Sahl al-Ghab: 2020-05-05 Idlib frontlines | Regime forces try to infiltrate and oppositions factions repel
Sahl al-Ghab: 2019-09-05 Roadside bomb injures 4 Syrian Army personnel in Daraa
Sahl al-Ghab: 2019-07-20 Squadron of warplanes and helicopter carry out tens of airstrikes on areas in the countryside of Hama and Idlib
Sahl al-Ghab: 2020-05-05 Idlib frontlines | Regime forces try to infiltrate and oppositions factions repel
Sahl al-Ghab: 2019-09-05 Roadside bomb injures 4 Syrian Army personnel in Daraa
Sahl al-Ghab: 2019-07-20 Squadron of warplanes and helicopter carry out tens of airstrikes on areas in the countryside of Hama and Idlib