On Friday, over 1000 fresh Syrian soldiers arrived to Aleppo city to speed up the Syrian Arab Army’s (SAA) offensive and open up a brand new flank in Syria’s largest city.
Several contingents of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP) and Syrian marines arrived in the city, most of which were redeployed from the Latakia governorate.
Meanwhile, the SAA’s elite assault troops, the Tiger Forces, were able to impose full control over the Al-Abbas Mosque, the Hanano Cultural Center and all surrounding buildings, thereby securing the vast majority of the Hanano district in northeastern Aleppo.
In addition, the SAA’s Republican Guard and Liwa al-Quds (Palestinian paramilitary) seized the ‘police hill’ and a handful of buildings at the Sheikh Lufti area in southeastern Aleppo.
Given the current rate of advance, the SAA could recapture Aleppo entirely in the matter of a few months. However, according to an Al-Masdar source embedded with the Tiger Forces, the SAA’s Military High Command will sue for diplomatic solution for the relatively densely populated rebel-held neighbourhoods of Old Aleppo.
Leading the decisive final battle for Aleppo will be the Tiger Forces, Desert Hawks Brigade, the 4th Mechanized Division, the Republican Guard, the al-Ba’ath Brigades, the Interior Ministry’s special forces, the SSNP, Syrian Marines, Liwa al-Quds, Hezbollah (Lebanese paramilitary), Harakat al-Nujba (Iraqi paramilitary), and Liwa Fatemiyoun (Afghani paramilitary).
A larger version of the map can be found here.
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