Rebels' concerns have dramatically mounted amid fears of imminent siege for their areas in Aleppo after the fall of Safira town by the Assad army, according to Zaman Alwasl sources.
The towns of Aziziyeh and Sfeira lie on a road the army said would be used to send in medicine and supplies to government-controlled areas of Aleppo, mired in a bloody stalemate for over a year. It is also the site of a chemical weapons installation under government control and cleared of equipment.
The capture of towns is significant in that it marks a rare victory for Assad's forces near the mostly rebel-held north. Opposition groups confirmed the army's seizure of the city, southeast of Aleppo.
Rebel groups have become increasingly fractured, with Islamic extremists, including those linked to al-Qaida, analyst Ahmed Khlaif, based in Qameshli said to Zaman Alwasl, ''The rebel war-within pushed the armed opposition to lose Sfira and perhaps more areas, as they lost before Khanaser town, Sfira neighbor, with its strategic road for supplies and ammunition.''
The conflict in Syria, now more than 2-1/2-years old, has long been in stalemate but Assad's forces have been making slow advances in the center of the country and near the capital since they captured a strategic border town near Lebanon with the help of the Lebanese Shi'ite militant group Hezbollah.
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