ISIS News: Jihadists and Regime Fighters In Bitter Struggle
In the battle for Syria, it seems President Bashar al-Assad is slowly starting to slip on his power and authority as news just came in suggesting a second regime stronghold is on the verge of falling in the hands of the Islamic State.
According to CNN, human rights groups report that the strategic city of Deir Ezzor is slowly turning into the ghost town that Raqqa looks like today. The war between regime fighters and ISIS forces continues to batter the city and its people.
Hundreds have been killed — both fighters and civilians — as the battle heats up. Fierce exchanges of gunfire and bombs have been raging over the past week and it is expected that if al-Assad's fighters fall short for even a split second, ISIS will immediately take over the city.
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Russia has reportedly been dropping supplies for army posts trying to fend off the jihadists, and while it is yet to be revealed if airstrikes have helped to lessen the pressure on ground combatants, ISIS has claimed to seize a number of districts still controlled by al-Assad.
According to the Institute for the Study of War, "The shift in Russian air operations serves to forestall the immediate defeat of regime forces in Deir Ezzor, one of the last remaining regime outposts in Eastern Syria." Aside from Russia's airstrikes that are hitting not only regime combatants but also civilians, the strong drive that ISIS has been showing for the past week is looking to turn the city upside down.
Last year, the U.S.-led coalition that aims to destroy the ISIS while trying to keep civilians off the battle questioned Russia for its decisions to be part of the war. Due to reports handed over by the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights that state hundreds of people have been killed in just over a week, doubts on Russia is piling up once more. The doubts have only gone overboard after some speculated that the supplies delivered by the country may have actually fallen to the hands of the enemy.
