BEIRUT: President Bashar al-Assad told his troops on Wednesday that their battle against rebels would determine Syria’s fate but his written message gave no clues to his whereabouts two weeks after a bomb attack hit his inner circle.
Assad has not spoken in public since the bombing in Damascus on July 18 killed four of his close security aides although he has been seen on television.
His latest remarks – made as the two sides battled for control of Syria’s commercial capital Aleppo – appeared in a statement in the military’s magazine to mark armed forces day.
But it was not clear exactly when or where he was speaking, indicating heightened concern over his personal security in the wake of the bombing at the defense headquarters in the capital.
“The fate of our people and our nation, past, present and future, depends on this battle,” he said.
Assad is trying to crush a 17-month uprising against his rule. Rebels took their fight last month to the capital Damascus, seized several border posts and are now fighting Assad’s forces in Syria’s biggest city, Aleppo.
Assad said the army had proved “through confronting the terrorist criminal gangs throughout the past period that you have steely resolve and conscience, and that you are the trustees of the people’s values.”
“My trust in you is great, and the trust of our people in you that you are … the defender of its just causes,” Assad said in comments which the state news agency SANA said were published in Syria’s armed forces magazine.
The battle for Aleppo has become a crucial test for both sides. Neither Assad’s forces nor the rebels can afford to lose if they hope to prevail in the wider struggle for Syria.
Since last month’s bomb attack, the fighting has become more intense, reaching into Damascus and Aleppo for the first time in the 17-month-old uprising against the Assad dynasty.
The Salaheddine district in the southwest of Aleppo has been the scene of some of the worst clashes, with shells raining down for hours at a time.
While the Syrian army said at the weekend it had taken control of Salaheddine, scrappy street fighting was still underway with neither government forces nor rebels in full control. Salaheddine resembles a ghost town, its shops shuttered, with little sign of normal life.
Rebel fighters, some in balaclavas and others with scarves around their faces, fired machineguns and assault rifles around street corners at invisible enemies. Wounded civilians and fighters were carried to makeshift dressing stations.
Syrian state television said on Tuesday troops in Salaheddine were still pursuing remaining “terrorists”.
A rebel commander said his fighters’ aim was to push towards the city centre, district by district, a goal he believed they could achieve “within days, not weeks”.
The rebels say they now control an arc that covers eastern and southwestern districts.
“The regime has tried for three days to regain Salaheddine, but its attempts have failed and it has suffered heavy losses in human life, weapons and tanks, and it has been forced to withdraw,” said Colonel Abdel-Jabbar al-Oqaidi, head of the Joint Military Council, one of several rebel groups in Aleppo.
Oqaidi, who defected from the army six months ago, told Reuters that more than 3,000 rebel fighters were in Aleppo.
According to an NBC News, the rebels have acquired nearly two dozen surface-to-air missiles which could tilt the battlefield balance if the rebels were able to shoot down government helicopter and war planes. (Reuters)