(Zaman Al Wasl)- Powerful Tahrir al-Sham alliance on Saturday vowed a bitter defeat for the Turkish-backed Syrian rebels hours after the President Tayyip Erdogan declared “a serious operation” to begin in Idlib as Free Syrian Army is preparing to enter the area with the backing of Turkish forces.
The former al-Qaeda branch said in statement that the ‘Factions of Treason have chosen to stand alongside the Russian occupier.'
Idlib and surrounding areas are among the largest bastions for rebel groups fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, but have increasingly fallen under the sway of jihadist insurgent factions, Reuters reported.
“Today there’s a serious operation in Idlib and it will continue, because we have to extend a hand to our brothers in Idlib and to our brothers who arrived in Idlib,” Erdogan said.
“Now this step has been taken, and it is underway,” he said, adding that Turkish forces were not yet involved at that it was a rebel operation so far.
Turkey-backed Free Syrian Army (FSA) groups in the Euphrates Shield campaign that Ankara launched in northern Syria last year are ready to cross into northwest Syria from Turkey, Mustafa Sejari, a senior official in the Liwa al-Mutasem group said.
“The Free Syrian Army with support from Turkish troops is in full readiness to enter the area but until this moment there is no movement,” he said.
Erdogan said last month that Turkey would deploy troops in Syria’s northwest Idlib province as part of a so-called de-escalation agreement brokered by Russia in August.
Another FSA rebel in the Euphrates Shield campaign told Reuters he believed an incursion into northwest Syria was imminent.
The Hamza Brigade, also part of Euphrates Shield, posted video online of what it said was a convoy of its forces heading for Idlib.
Residents near the Bab al-Hawa border crossing with Turkey in Syria sent Reuters photographs of what they said was a section of the frontier wall being removed by the Turkish authorities.
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