Opposition forces take Syria’s Daraa, Astana-track meeting to be held 

The Syrian army has withdrawn from much of the southern region as opposition fighters continue their lightning offensive, making gains in Daraa and Sweida.

Daraa-based opposition forces on Saturday said they seized control of the city, the fourth strategic loss for President Bashar al-Assad’s forces in a week.

Daraa was dubbed “the cradle of the revolution” early in Syria’s war as government repression of protests failed to quell the people’s anger over the detention and torture of a group of boys for scribbling anti-Assad graffiti on their school walls in 2011. In April of that year, the regime besieged the city, a move seen as having militarised the revolution.

On Friday evening, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said local factions had taken control of more than 90 percent of Daraa province, including the eponymous city.

In neighbouring Sweida, the Syrian Observatory and local media said the Syrian army had withdrawn and the governor, the police and prison chiefs, and the local Baath Party leader had left their offices as local fighters took control of several checkpoints.

Sweida is the heartland of Syria’s Druze minority and has witnessed antigovernment demonstrations for more than a year, as the cost of living shot up and tens of thousands of Druze men refused to undertake compulsory military service.

After the fall of Daraa and Sweida early Saturday, Syrian government forces remained in control of Damascus, Homs, Latakia and Tartus.

The Observatory also said the Syrian army on Saturday withdrew from Quneitra, which borders the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

Losing ground

“Our forces operating in Daraa and Sweida are redeploying and establishing a … security cordon … after terrorist elements attacked remote army checkpoints,” the army general command said in a statement carried by Syrian state media on Saturday.

The army said it was setting up a “defensive and security belt in the area,” apparently to defend Damascus from the south.

The army added it was “beginning to regain control in Homs and Hama provinces” as Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr reported from Lebanon that Syrian and Russian air strikes hit north Homs in the early hours of Saturday morning.

Hama fell to opposition fighters on Thursday and they advanced southwards towards Homs, five days after they took the second-largest city of Aleppo.

“[Opposition forces] are now at the gates of Homs,” said Khodr, reporting from the Bekaa Valley in Lebanon.

“They have repeated a call to government troops to surrender,” she said. “This could indicate that the government intends to put up a fight.

“It’s unclear whether or not they can hold on to Homs, a strategic city at the crossroads between Damascus and the regime’s heartlands along the coast.”

Since a rebel alliance led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) launched its lightning offensive on November 27, the government has steadily lost ground.

As the army and its Iran-backed militia allies pulled out of Deir az Zor in eastern Syria, Kurdish-led forces said on Friday they had crossed the Euphrates River and taken control of the territory that had been vacated.

Never in the war had al-Assad’s forces lost control of so many key cities in such a short space of time.

Diplomatic push

Turkiye’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan is set to meet with his Russian and Iranian counterparts in Doha on Saturday to seek a solution to the renewed fighting in Syria and prevent chaos on its borders.

The three countries have been partners since 2017 in the Astana process seeking to end the war in Syria, even as they support opposite sides on the battlefield.

Moscow and Tehran supported al-Assad in crushing the opposition while Ankara supported various rebel movements and views their recent advances favourably.

“Diplomacy now may focus on working out an exit option for the regime and ensuring an orderly transition,” Berkay Mandiraci, a senior Turkiye analyst at the International Crisis Group told Al Jazeera.

“The unexpected rebel advances … came at a time when the regime’s main backers – Russia and Iranian proxies – have been bogged down in other conflict theatres,” Mandiraci added.

On Friday, Syrian Foreign Minister Bassam Sabbagh met in Baghdad with his Iraqi and Iranian counterparts, warning that the offensive threatens regional stability.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein condemned the offensive, and said Iraq “cannot be part of any war”.

Syria’s civil war has killed more than 500,000 people and forced more than half the population to flee their homes.