For months, the Free Syrian Army’s (FSA) Central Command and their foreign handlers have been strategizing for this imperative offensive at the provincial capital of Dara’a; however, their contingency to take this integral city in southern Syria has seemingly flopped, as the Syrian Arab Army’s 5th Armored Division surprised the rebel forces with their discipline and stiff resistance.
Not only has the offensive at Dara’a City and Khirbat Al-Ghazaleh failed to produce any significant gains on the ground, but also, it has resulted in the death of well over 200 militants from the Free Syrian Army’s “Southern Front” Brigades and their allies from the Syrian Al-Qaeda group “Jabhat Al-Nusra” that participated in this failed offensive.
On Monday, the FSA’s Southern Front and Jabhat Al-Nusra remained rather stagnate inside the provincial capital, as their militants only clashed with SAA’s 5th Division near the Air Force Intelligence (AFI) building and at the southern axis of the Al-Manashiyah District; this marked the first time in one week that the rebel forces did press any further in the provincial capital.
To add to their plight in southern Syria, the Southern Front’s joint offensives with Jabhat Al-Nusra and Jaysh Al-Yarmouk at the Al-Quneitra and Al-Sweida Governorates have also failed to produce any gains, despite the media build-up by their social media activists and journalists.
Things were allegedly so bad in the aforementioned provinces that the FSA’s Southern Front and their allies have actually lost ground in the Al-Sweida Governorate, as the Druze Civil Defense Forces and the Syrian Armed Forces have secured over 15 square kilometers of territory around the western perimeter of the once besieged Tha’lah Military Airbase.
