Syrian Regime Unleashes Artillery Barrage on Qusayr Backed by Hizbullah, Takes Key Town
إقرأ هذا الخبر بالعربية
Syrian forces entered a key objective north of the besieged central town of Qusayr on Saturday, the army said, battling rebels inside the former military airport of Dabaa.
"The Syrian army infiltrated Dabaa airport from the northwest, and now fighting is taking place inside the airport after they broke the rebel defense lines," an army source said.
Activists said elite troops from the army and its ally Hizbullah led the attack.
The former military airport lies just outside Qusayr on the only road north of the town.
Earlier on Saturday, forces loyal to Assad unleashed their heaviest artillery and rocket barrage yet in a week-long battle to dislodge rebels from a strategic western town, activists said.
Pro-Assad troops, including fighters from Hizbullah, have been trying to push rebels out of Qusayr. They have gained ground, but rebels have clung to some positions.
Rami Abdul Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told Agence France Presse "the fighting and shelling, which took place on Saturday on the main roads inside and outside of Qusayr, are the most intense since the beginning of the offensive."
He said Qusayr, rebel areas north of the town like Hamdiyeh, Dabaa and Arjuneh have been subjected to heavy bombardment by regime forces using surface-to-surface missiles.
Qusayr is a key prize for the rebels, a conduit through which weapons and fighters can be channeled from Lebanon, only about 10 kilometers (six miles) away.
It is also important for Assad's forces because of its strategic location between Damascus and the Mediterranean coast, the Alawite heartland of the embattled president's regime.
Rahman said "the intensification of the fighting can be explained by Hizbullah's desire to score points before the speech their leader Hasan Nasrallah is due to deliver this evening," marking the 13th anniversary of Israel's withdrawal from Lebanon.
On Friday, anti-regime demonstrators across Syria denounced the Hizbullah chief, waving placards reading "Nasrallah, impostor of the resistance," and "Homs is not Jerusalem," a reference to the group's slogan about liberating Jerusalem.
25 May 2013, 11:58
48
HA is hated in Lebanon, and most want its demise. They have no choice but to fight in Syria for their own survival and the regime.
25 May 2013, 13:17
35
No one blame the Free Syrian Army when they start attacking sites in Lebanon in hizbocrap areas.
25 May 2013, 14:22
00
You can all keep whining all day about the true reason of their involvement in Syria, fact is it is Hezballah who are doing the right thing by cleansing this planet from the kamikazes, throat slitting, marathon bombers, 9/11 plane hijackers sunni salafi scum and al qaeda wannabes that are flocking to Syria from all around the world and who would othewise be planning their next terrorist activity to murder innocents.
25 May 2013, 15:51
23
now M8ers are going to have hard ons.... after pretending that hezb were there ONLY to defend lebanese border villages we see the true hypocrit game of hezbis... we told them that but got insulted...
now they are trying to find lame excuses to justify their presence there... they are trying to do their best to make them look like heroes...
hypocrits at the service of hypocrits... not ashamed of dragging lebanon into chaos. not ashamed to say the contrary of what they always pretended that hezbis arms were only aimed at israel...
they will do everything they can to say it all the fault of M14 and that they are victims and clean! LOL....
brave little bashar bootlickers
25 May 2013, 15:57
00
With every new town that the Syrian regime cleans from the multi-national "Syrian, of course" rebels, the regime gets one giant step closer to collapsing. If what you read here on Naharnet and elsewhere is not convincing, then I refer you to the Lebanese NostraDamsels, mainly NostraGabbyMarch14, NostraAllouchti, NostraPeace, NostraBenzona, NostraPrimeSuspect and last but not least, the New Nostra in Town, NostraHarrier, the fellow graduate from Mehrab Academy - NostraGeagea School for Advanced Studies in Military Strategy, Intelligence and Tactics of Failure. You go, Nostras.
25 May 2013, 17:10
00
The sslafist mercenaries do not want to comprehend that their victory in Syria means annihilation for Hezbollah.They will have to die and in the end Israel wins and Islam loses. Syria will be in ruin alike Aleppo fter 3 years there won't be anything worth fighting for except slogans and Asir's beard and maybe the Saudi's will buy Harari some new $5000.00 suits and the USA will furmnish him a bullet proof Cadillac Escalade.
25 May 2013, 17:31
15
Awireless - in 2006, i was one of the key organizers of demonstations and media action against insrael and in support of lebanon in 2006 along with many Lebanese from all sects. I took weeks off work and spent thousands of dollars. In 1996, i did the same. My brother in lebanon volunteered to assist refugees from the south. As an atheist, he could care less about sects. His impression that many of these refugees were brainwashed. They openend the schools for refugees. The people of the town brought in food, beds, clothes ...you name it. Some of the refugees started to throw stuff and kicked volunteers out of school because they belonged to al-mustaqbal and they threw donated items out of windows.
25 May 2013, 17:40
14
"ome of the refugees started to throw stuff and kicked volunteers out of school because they belonged to al-mustaqbal and they threw donated items out of windows."
true i witnessed that... plus some even didn t want any meat from sunni villages saying it was impure meat...
25 May 2013, 17:36
03
Now - to claim that somehow the people in lebanon and syria are responsible for attacks against shiites in pakistan is truly lunatic and show how weak the hizbi argument has become. For me, the hizb went from being the honoroble muqawama to a thuggish militia supporting a monstrous regime.
26 May 2013, 04:25
00
I thought they captured the town like a week ago, what happened? Takes a whole week for all of Hizb Allah and the Syrian artillery to capture a town of 20 thousand people defended by rebels that have no air support and no artillery? Smalla 3aleikon...
