What's Going on in Syria?

Some quick analysis of the rebel offensive in northwestern Syria

Map of areas of control in Syria before the rebel offensive on November 27, 2024. Source: Wikimedia Commons

Hello again dear readers,

I know I do not usually post this often, but so much is happening so quickly I feel as though I must get back to regular writing after taking a bit of a break in recent months to focus on work. As a fragile ceasefire in Lebanon came into effect today, rebels in Syria launched an offensive in the western Aleppo countryside, capturing several villages and a major military base. I realize that I haven’t written about current events in Syria for some time, and I thought it would be good to write something about this given the fact that it has gotten very little coverage. I originally intended to cover developments in all of Syria, but I don’t have the time or energy. I will try to write more about Syria, however, soon.

A new offensive in northwestern Syria

The al-Fatah al-Mubin Operations Room, which is led by Hya’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), announced an offensive the morning of November 27, 2024, advancing in the western Aleppo countryside. The offensive, titled the “Deterrence of Aggression,” has already seen rebel forces capture the villages of Urum al-Kubra, Qubtan al-Jabal, Sheikh Aqil, Hower, and Ajil, with rebels forces moving into Kafr Naha by the end of the day. The rebels also managed to capture Base 46, an important position from which government forces shelled rebel-held towns. The base is located on the main road between Atarib and Urum al-Kubra.

Map of rebel gains I quickly threw together

Rebel forces seem to be advancing on three main axes: one toward Anadan, one toward Kafr Dael along the Aleppo-Darat Izza Road, and one toward Khan al-Asal. As of the most recent reports, government forces have withdrawn to Khan al-Asal and its police school just west of the town, with the rebels trying to maximize their gains before the government is able to organize a counteroffensive. Other reports on social media suggest government forces and supplies have been captured, and it seems that they were not at all prepared for the offensive.

The government and Russia have responded to the attack by bombarding rebel-held towns, namely Atarib and Darat Izza, which have been free of the regime for over a decade. Government forces also pounded rebel positions at critical points along the frontlines.

For some quick background, the Turkish border regions of northwestern Syrian have been under rebel control since the spring and summer of 2012, when rebel groups began to seize large swaths of territory across peripheral regions of Syria. I wrote a post this past summer about this period, though the piece needs to be thoroughly edited and updated. As the years went on, smaller rebel factions were either destroyed or consumed by larger and better organized groups, with the Idlib and western Aleppo regions eventually falling under the control of HTS, the contemporary iteration of the al-Qaeda-aligned Nusra Front (ties that it allegedly broke some years ago). In 2020, the government launched a large-scale offensive with Russian and Iranian backing to dislodge rebels from the M5 Highway which connects Aleppo to Damascus. The offensive ended in a Russian-Turkish deal that froze the frontlines and has been in place since then.

Though there have been some indications and rumors of a rebel offensive in recent months, most, including myself, dismissed them as wishful thinking at best or disinformation at worst. However, today that was proven incorrect. The rebels clearly achieved the element of surprise and have made substantial gains in only a day. In 2012, when rebels first advanced in this area, it took two months of siege to capture Base 46, with the frontlines looking rather similar. Either way, the rebels are continuing their push toward Aleppo city, and we will see in the coming days how close they can get before the government responds.

Rebel control in Aleppo Governorate by September 25, 2012. Areas of the map shaded in red were government bases under rebel siege.

The rebels gave two primary motivations and goals for the offensive: to prevent the government from shelling rebel areas and to allow the displaced to return to their homes. The government has not commented much on the attack, if at all, which is typical when there’s bad news for government forces. The first thing to note here is that, regardless of the authenticity of the motivations announced by the rebels, the lines on the map in Syria generally only change if one of the countries entangled in Syria’s misery say so. In this case, it is difficult to imagine that HTS and the other factions involved would launch such an offensive without Turkish approval.

Turkey and the Syrian government have been engaged in normalization talks for some time, but they have made little to no progress for a variety of reasons, mostly due to the fact that their goals and interests are almost completely mutually exclusive. I remember covering the protests in northern Syria in August, 2022 when Turkey’s Foreign Minister revealed that he had spoken with his Syrian counterpart regarding reconciliation between the opposition and the regime in Damascus. However, nothing has really materialized since then, and the opposition has effectively shown no interest in reconciling with the regime.

Pro-regime telegram channels are seemingly blaming Israel for the offensive, claiming that it was timed to coincide with the ceasefire in Lebanon (which I will write about soon). Though Israel did support the rebels in Syria, this support was almost exclusively constrained to the country’s south, namely the areas that border the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights and Jordan. The shot-callers in northwestern Syria are Turkey, Russia, and, to some degree, Iran, so Israel was likely not involved in the attack. The timing is peculiar, however, though it is hard to make any grand assertions while the situation is still developing and so little information is available. It would make sense to launch an offensive when Hezbollah, a vital component of pro-regime forces, has been pre-occupied with the war with Israel. It is unclear how long the planning for this offensive was in the making, but rumors of a rebel offensive seemingly began to spread in early October shortly after the war in Lebanon escalated.

From what I have seen, the rebels have not said much about their military goals for this offensive, though there are a few possibilities. The rebels may seek to cut the M5 Highway, thus blocking the main route that connects Damascus to Aleppo, but the government would still be able to use roads in the southern Aleppo countryside. It is also possible that the goal is to move into positions overlooking Aleppo city, allowing the rebels to fire on the city’s more affluent Western neighborhoods where support for Bashar al-Assad and his regime in Damascus is the strongest. Finally, the goal could be to capture Anadan and isolate the Tel Rifa’at pocket, which is controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a coalition between the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and some rebel factions. Again, in this scenario, government forces and the SDF would still be able to maintain their supply lines via the areas of the northern Aleppo countryside under government control. It should be noted that the offensive could have all or some of these goals in mind.

The rebels have likely not communicated their intentions because it is highly unlikely that the rebels will be able to maintain their momentum or hold the positions they have captured. The military balance of power might briefly be in the rebels’ favor, but once government forces fully mobilize, they will almost certainly be able to recapture the territory that was lost assuming there is no negotiated ceasefire put in place before then. This leads me to believe that, at least for HTS, the goal is to boost its popularity, as the group has increasingly come under scrutiny for corruption and abusive practices. Indeed, earlier this month, protesters in Idlib and west Aleppo called for HTS to open up new fronts with the regime, and an offensive may be a way to dampen popular anger against the group. Turkish approval for such a move would still likely be needed, but it is possible that Turkey also has anxieties regarding HTS’s popular legitimacy.

One of the reasons the fighting in northwestern Syria was frozen in 2020 was because Idlib is Turkey’s achilles heal. The region has become home to millions of displaced Syrians, and, if HTS’s governing body in northwestern Syria, the Syrian Salvation Government, were to collapse or become destabilized, even more Syrians could be pushed into Turkey. Any indication that another wave of Syrians would seek refuge in Turkey could be the death knells for Turkish Pres. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his ruling AKP party, as the Turkish electorate is increasingly unhappy with the presence of Syrian refugees in their country. This rise in anti-Syrian sentiment has been exacerbated by the continued stagnation of the Turkish economy, something for which many blame Erdoğan. Given these factors, it is unsurprising that one of the rebels’ state goals is to return the displaced to their homes.

Geopolitically, Russia has also sought to exploit this weakness, as Turkey and Russia are on opposing sides in several conflicts outside of Syria, including Libya and the Caucasus, yet the pair generally have relatively cordial relations. If said relations were to ever sour to an extreme enough degree, Russia could assist the Syrian government in retaking rebel areas of northern Syria, pushing millions of displaced Syrians into Turkey. Likewise, Turkey could inflict quite a bit of pain on Russia if it were to ever close the Bosphorus, Russia’s main sea route to the Mediterranean.

I could write more about historic distrust and competition between Turkey and Russia, but that is for another day. Either way, Russia and Turkey are generally better off playing nice with each other, even if they are often at odds geopolitically. So, for Turkey, the offensive could be a way to, first and foremost, reduce internal pressures on HTS while also pressuring the Syrian government and/or Russia into concessions on some other file, though it is not immediately apparent to me what that may be. I will have to think more about it.

Turkey has also been very concerned with the SDF, as the YPG, its primary fighting force, is an affiliate of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has been fighting the Turkish state for around four decades. The SDF controls northeastern Syria, where US troops are stationed, but, as I mentioned earlier, it also controls a small pocket of territory in the northern Aleppo countryside around Tel Rifa’at. Russian and Iranian forces are deployed to the area, thus preventing Turkey from launching an offensive there. The rebel offensive has also coincided with talks between Ankara and the PKK, which have been quite tense.

Interestingly, the Tel Rifa’at pocket is located right next to the Shiite villages of Nubl and Zahraa, which were under rebel siege for over three years. Hezbollah and other Iran-backed armed groups are present in the villages, and perhaps another rebel goal is to isolate them, though it is unclear to me why that would be the case. A good indicator of rebel intentions will be if Turkish-backed groups in the northern Aleppo countryside join the fight and potentially try to advance near al-Bab in an attempt to encircle Tel Rifa’at. Honestly, however, I think this is unlikely, but who knows.

Anyway, I will update you, dear readers, as the situation progresses. Keep in mind that I have not been following Syria as closely due to the war, and my observations may need to be taken with a grain of salt. I will also write more about the ceasefire in Lebanon soon. In fact, I had planned to write about it today, but the rebel offensive has briefly stolen my attention, and I would like to wait a few more days to see how things progress in South Lebanon. It was, frankly, a relief when the clock struck 9:00 PM last night (4:00 AM local time) and the fighting ended. I hope the ceasefire holds, and I was glad to see that displaced Lebanese are returning to their homes. However, the war is not yet over, and Israel is still pummeling Gaza as it works to completely ethnically cleanse the north and continue its genocidal campaign in the strip. I will stay alert as always.

Til next time.