The regime force and the Russian impose their control over about 30% of the area of Deir Ezzor province and ISIS loses about half of its controlled area there
Deir Ezzor heads the Syrian scene, with its cities, towns and villages, with its military operations which finished their 81st day since the first entry of the regime forces entered to the province in the 27th July 2017, and also with the shelling, raids and clashes, which turned the province into fighting bloc, among the three force there, the first is the “Islamic State” organization which used to be headed with its control over the most of the province, the second is the regime forces backed by armed militiamen loyal to them of Syrian and non-Syrian nationalities under the command of Russia, and the third is the Syria Democratic Forces supported by the International Coalition which launched their last battle “Al-Jazeera Storm”
The military operations are continuing in the province, racing the time, and each party of the both attacking parties, the regime forces in one area and the Syria Democratic Forces in another one, is trying to achieve advancement rapidly at the expense of ISIS which is losing villages, towns and cities one after another, and collapsing consecutively, the matter that makes it lose its controlled areas in the province where it prevailed, before the start of the military operation, the “conscription” in which it forced the civilian young men to join its ranks, and warned and threatened “those who did not join voluntarily…they would forced to join”, and the pace of the military operation which the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitored, started to increase day after day, so that the regime forces could manage in the 10th of September 2017, to lift the siege on their controlled areas in Deir Ezzor city and their airbase and the military bases surrounding the city, and impose a siege which they tightened on Monday the 16th of October 2017, by encircling the entire city from the eastern banks of the Euphrates River opposite the city, and the regime forces advanced in its eastern countryside and imposed their control over the entire area extended on the western banks of the Euphrates River, from Deir Ezzor city to the east of Al-Mayadin city, accompanied by continuous shelling which reliable sources told the SOHR that it came as a preparation for a new crossing from a new area, to the direct eastern banks of the Euphrates River, in order to take the control of the areas opposite their controlled areas on the western banks of the river from Al-Mayadin to Deir Ezzor.
On the other front, the Syria Democratic Forces supported by the International Coalition and its warplanes, managed since the start of their military operation in the 7th of September 2017, to achieve great advancement in the northern and the north-western countryside of Deir Ezzor, with the north-eastern countryside of the city, and took the control of large areas included oil fields included Koniko field which is the biggest gas field and factory in Syria, amid successive withdrawals and collapses of the organization, in the face of the both forces advancing at its expense.
This wide advance has overturned the balance of control in the province, and the organization which used to control the most of Deir Ezzor province, controls now less than half of its area, in which the percentage of its controlled area reached today the 17th of October 2017, about 48.2% of the total area of Deir Ezzor province, while the regime forces advanced and became the second influential force in the province, by controlling more than the quarter of the total area of Deir Ezzor province, and the percentage of their controlled area reached 29.1% of the total area of province, while the SDF control an area of about 22.7% of the total area of Deir Ezzor province, and the violent clashes were accompanied by violent and intensive shelling by the International Coalition and the Russian as well as the regime’s warplanes and helicopters, which resulted in the destruction of the infrastructure and the damage of the properties of the citizens and public facilities, and the displacement of tens of thousands of citizens from their villages and towns and cities, towards Deir Ezzor desert, in an attempt to escape from death and murder.
It is noteworthy that the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights published on the 12th of October 2017, that it learned from a number of reliable sources, that about 1000 commander and fighters of the organization had arrived at its controlled areas in Deir Ezzor countryside, of non-Syrian nationalities, most of them are of Asian nationalities, and some of the fighters are of a brigade called “Al-Qa’qa’ Brigade” operating in Iraq, and the fighters deployed in different fronts in Deir Ezzor and the Syrian Desert, after two weeks of the arrival of hundreds of fighters of ISIS from Iraq of non-Syrian nationalities, who carried out side by side with the members existed before, an attack on the Syrian territory which targeted the western desert of Deir Ezzor and the eastern and the south eastern countryside of Homs, the SOHR also obtained information form reliable sources, that the 1000 fighters coming from Iraq, are gathering in a front in the “Islamic State” organization called “Al-Qaradish” which is composed of fighters Uzbek, Tajik, Azeri and Turkistan nationalities, in which this front received the command of the military operations in Al-Mayadin city and the eastern countryside of Deir Ezzor, and it’s known about this front that it doesn’t trust the Syrian or the Arab members operating in the “Islamic State” organization.