Syrian armed forces backed by fighters of the Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah have made fresh advances in their fight against Takfiri militants to take back control of the strategic border town of Zabadani.
According to Hezbollah’s al-Manar TV, the Syrian army units and allied Hezbollah fighters succeeded in gaining more ground in southeast of Zabadani as they recaptured several residential neighborhoods there on Saturday.
Earlier, Syrian soldiers managed to retake another neighborhood from the al-Qaeda-linked al-Nusra Front terrorists.
The advance in the flash-point city came amid reports that some militant groups have decided to surrender due to the tightening siege on their positions. The allied forces have already established full control over major entrances of Zabadani as well as key plains south of the city.
As a highly strategic town in Syria’s Rif Dimashq Province, Zabadani has been a major stronghold of terrorist groups such as al-Nusra and Ahrar al-Sham. The city has enabled the terrorists to move along the Syrian-Lebanese border and transfer ammunition and forces into areas not far from the Syrian capital, Damascus.
Meanwhile, reports also said Kurdish fighters have taken control of more areas in the northeastern city of Hasakah.
The so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Saturday that the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) “are advancing in Hasakah city against ISIL.”
The UK-based group added that the Kurdish fighters are now in control of 70 percent of the city while the Syrian government and ISIL terrorists have 20 and 10 percent of the metropolis under control, respectively.
The monitoring group added that the ISIL terrorists are now "surrounded" in four small neighborhoods in the south of the city.