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Middle East|Syrian Troops Drive IS Out of Historic Palmyra
| New York Times | - |
DAMASCUS,
Syria - Syrian government forces backed by Russian airstrikes drove
Islamic State fighters from Palmyra on Sunday, ending the group's reign
of terror over a town whose famed 2,000-year-old ruins once drew tens of
thousands of visitors each ...
Middle East
Syrian Troops Said to Recapture Historic Palmyra From ISIS
BEIRUT,
Lebanon — Syrian government forces recaptured the desert oasis city of
Palmyra on Sunday, state media and a monitoring group reported, after
driving out Islamic State fighters who had imposed a brutal occupation
for the better part of a year, summarily executing residents and
dynamiting the city’s ancient ruins.
Syrian
state media, which has closely covered a three-week push by President
Bashar al-Assad to regain the city, aired celebratory footage on Sunday
showing government soldiers around the archaeological sites. The Syrian
Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group, said that there was
ongoing fighting in a few districts of the city, as well as at a
military prison.
But
the majority of the Islamic State contingent in Palmyra had withdrawn
or been routed, with hundreds of its fighters killed, the Observatory
said, highlighting the extremist group’s broader struggles to retain
territory in Syria
and Iraq. At the same time, the advance by Mr. Assad’s troops handed
him a strategically important military victory that added weight to
contention that his government is a crucial bulwark against the
jihadists of the Islamic State.
Graphic: What Russia Accomplished in Syria
The
battle also provided the latest evidence of how significantly Russia’s
intervention on behalf of Mr. Assad had transformed his fortunes. The
Islamic State fighters had easily taken Palmyra last May from Syrian
government troops that had hardly mounted a fight. The recapture of the
city on Sunday came after Russia carried out intensive airstrikes in
support of the government coalition attacking Palmyra.
Residents
of the city had been caught between the combatants since the city fell,
subject to the jihadists’ unforgiving strictures and pitiless violence,
while also enduring heavy shelling on civilian areas by government
forces.
During
their occupation, Islamic State fighters publicized their destruction
of several significant monuments in the ancient city, a Unesco World
Heritage site, and the entrance of government forces over the last few
days allowed closer assessments by antiquities officials.
Khaled
al-Homsi, an anti-government activist and native of the city who now
lives outside of Syria, said that television footage appeared to show
damage to a medieval citadel that faced his former home.
The Islamic State fighters, he said, “did damage to ruins that can never be compensated.”
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