Syria (and Beyond) Live Coverage: The Insurgents Hold Out in Aleppo
Thursday, August 9, 2012 at 23:12 | James Miller in Africa, EA Global, EA Middle East and Turkey, Middle East and Iran A demonstration last night in Nile Street in Aleppo in Syria
1944 GMT: Syria. Yesterday we posted reports that Kafranbel, a town in Idlib made famous for its witty protest signs made in English, was under heavy attack by regime forces (map). At the end of the day, there was little news beyond the report that many shells had fallen and many civilians were injured.
Previous regime incursions into Idlib have ended very poorly, with many destroyed tanks, killed soldiers, and even with large amounts of defectors and armored vehicles falling into the hands of the Free Syrian Army. From the looks of this fight, it appeared different, as if the military were focusing on shelling the city from afar, and were committing far more forces to the fight than before.
However, history repeats itself. News broke today that the FSA had inflicted heavy losses yesterday. One video claimed to show that the FSA had destroyed an armored vehicle and a hospital that had been occupied by the military. Those victories were only the tip of the iceberg. Many videos are emerging, each matching a series of separate activist reports, that show a large amount of destroyed military equipment after heavy battles today: