BEIRUT, April 20, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – Islamic State group jihadists have
killed 27 pro-Damascus fighters in the Syrian desert, in what a monitoring
group described Saturday as their deadliest operation since the fall of the
“caliphate”.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said four senior
Syrian army officers were among the troops and allied militiamen killed in
the desert east of Homs province over the past 48 hours.
The Amaq propaganda arm of IS, which lost the last vestige of its
“caliphate” to Kurdish-led forces last month but retains desert and mountain
hideouts in both Syria and Iraq, said its fighters carried out the operation.
Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman described it as the “biggest attack and
the highest death toll among regime forces since the caliphate was declared
defeated”.
Six IS fighters were killed in the clashes, the Observatory said.
Amaq said that IS had launched its assault on Thursday evening after
government forces tried to track down its fighters.
The vast Syrian desert, known in Arabic as the Badia, stretches all the way
from the capital Damascus and the cities of Homs and Hama to its north to the
Euphrates Valley near the Iraq border, where IS made a desperate last stand
for its final pocket of territory.