BEIRUT, LEBANON (4:30 P.M.) – A massive explosion rocked the provincial capital of the Idlib Governorate this afternoon, opposition activists reported via social media.

According to the reports, a car bomb targeted the Hay’at Tahrir Al-Sham base inside the southern part of Idlib city, killing at least 15 people and wounding 20 more.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack as of yet.

Today’s blast marks the second time in the last 24 hours that Idlib city has experienced a car bombing that was conducted by unknown assailants.

Advertisements </s> 13 people, including 10 civilians were killed, more than 25 others were injured after two bomb-laden vehicles exploded on a busy street in Syria's northwestern Idlib city center during rush hour, reports said Monday.

Both explosions reportedly took place on Al-Qusoor Street, reports said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the blasts killed 13 people and wounded 25.

The Edlib Media Center, an activist collective, said the bombings killed 10 and wounded dozens.

The first blast occurred in the early afternoon and another followed seconds later. The opposition's Syrian Civil Defense, a group of volunteer first responders, said one of its members was wounded.

The Syrian Civil Defense group, which arrived at the scene of the incident as response units, noted that the second explosion resulted in numerous casualties as it took place near an area with many civilians.

The city of Idlib is controlled by al-Qaida-linked Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which has wide influence in northern Syria.

The city has been hit with bombings in recent months that killed or wounded scores of people. </s> BEIRUT: An explosion in Syria's northwestern city of Idlib killed at least 23 people and injured tens more, including civilians, a war monitor reported on Sunday (Jan 7).

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the explosion targeted the headquarters of a minor rebel faction in Idlib.

The nature of the attack was not immediately clear. The monitor said there were conflicting accounts, attributing the explosion that shook the Thalatheen district of the city to either a car bomb or a drone attack.

Ambulances were deployed to the explosion site and rescue teams were continuing efforts to recover bodies and the injured from the rubble of the targeted building and neighbouring houses, the monitor added.

The majority of the deaths were fighters from the rebel group, in addition to seven civilians, with several people still unaccounted for, it said.

"A large explosion on Sunday evening hit the base of the Ajnad al-Qawqaz faction in Idlib," said Syrian Observatory for Human Rights head Rami Abdel Rahman, adding that most of the non-civilian casualties were fighters from the group.

Dozens of people were wounded, particularly fighters, according to Abdel Rahman who said the base was "almost completely destroyed" and that nearby buildings were damaged.

The Ajnad al-Qawqaz group includes hundreds of Caucasian fighters and is battling alongside the Fateh al-Sham Front, a former Al-Qaeda affiliate, to repel a Syrian regime advance in the southeast of Idlib province.

Idlib province is a stronghold of rebels in Syria and is situated on the border with Turkey, one of the main backers of rebellion against President Bashar al-Assad.

The Syrian army and its allies launched an offensive in October to recapture the provinces of Idlib and Hama, and it has since been making swift advances.

The area has seen intense clashes following a regime offensive aimed at seizing a strategically vital highway between Damascus and second city Aleppo.



The main rebel force in Idlib is Tahrir al-Sham, spearheaded by the former al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria previously called Nusra Front.

The Syrian army lost Idlib to insurgents when the provincial capital fell in 2015. It became the only province fully under opposition control.



The Britain-based Observatory, which relies on a network of activists across Syria, said regime forces had seized more than 60 villages in the area since Dec 25.

An alliance dominated by Fateh al-Sham controls much of Idlib province where there are regular car bombings, often blamed on disputes between armed factions.

Some residents blame the Islamic State group for such attacks, although the group has no open presence in the province. </s> In the deadliest attack to hit the Syrian capital city of Damascus in months, a group of car bombers attempted to infiltrate the city. Two were caught and detonated themselves outside the city, but a third managed to get all the way into Tahrir Square, blowing himself up there.

The Tahrir Square bombing killed at least 21 people and wounded 12 others. Identities of the victims are still not totally clear, but the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least seven members of the security forces were among the slain.

Where the other drivers were going isn’t totally clear, but they were intercepted at a roundabout not far from the airport. There has been no claim of responsibility for any of the attacks, though war-torn Syria has no shortage of Islamist factions liable to carry out such a strike.

The last large suicide bombing in Damascus, back in March, was carried out by Tahrir al-Sham, an Islamist coalition that includes al-Qaeda’s Nusra Front. There are multiple other Islamist factions, including ISIS, who are also potentially behind this latest attack.
• New York Times, AP Retract False Claims on Intel Report on Russia Hacking - July 1st, 2017
• As ISIS Wanes, New Wars Threaten to Emerge in Syria - June 30th, 2017 </s> At least 23 people were killed on Sunday, including seven civilians, and dozens injured after a powerful explosion aimed against the headquarters of an Islamic insurgent group in the city of Idlib, in northwestern Syria, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Amongst the injured there are serious and critical cases, which could increase the death toll in the next few hours, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights warned.

The organization could not determine whether the explosion was triggered by a regular bomb or a car bomb.

The target of the attack was the headquarters of the armed group "Soldiers of the Caucasus," one of the Islamic fundamentalist rebel groups operating in Idlib which is made up of fighters from Central Asia.

Rescue teams were transferring the wounded and the dead bodies and continuing the task to rescue those who are trapped under the rubble following the explosion.

The province is controlled almost entirely by the Organization for the Liberation of the Levant, an alliance created by al-Qaeda's former Syrian branch and other armed groups who are fighting against the forces loyal to the Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. </s> BEIRUT - An explosion killed 11 people and wounded more than 80 on Monday in the rebel-controlled Syrian city of Idlib, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.



The British-based war monitoring group said the source of the blast was unclear.



The Civil Defence in Idlib, a rescue service that operates in rebel territory, gave the death toll as at least 10 civilians with 110 others injured. It caused damage in four buildings, one of them entirely.



The northwestern Idlib region remains the largest populated area of Syria in the hands of insurgents fighting the Damascus government, including both jihadist factions and nationalist FSA rebels. The dominant force there is Hayat Tahrir al Sham, an Islamist alliance spearheaded by the former al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria.



Tens of thousands of fighters and civilians have poured into Idlib in recent years, after leaving other parts of the country which the army recaptured with the help of Russia and Iran. ( </s> Bomber blows himself up in Tahrir Square in Damascus, in biggest such attack since March

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A suicide car bomber pursued by security forces blew himself up in eastern Damascus on Sunday, killing 21 people, in the deadliest attack to hit the Syrian capital in months.

Syrian state media and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said security forces intercepted three car bombers on their way into the city early in the morning.

State television said two of the vehicles were blown up on the outskirts of the city but a third managed to reach the Tahrir Square district, where the driver was surrounded but able to detonate a bomb.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but previous deadly attacks in Damascus have been claimed by Isis and rival jihadist factions.

The UK-based Observatory said 21 people were killed in the bombing, including at least seven members of pro-regime security forces and two civilians. It had not identified the remaining victims. It said at least 12 other people were wounded in the blast.

The Syrian state news agency Sana quoted an interior ministry statement as saying two of the vehicles had been “destroyed” at a roundabout on the road to the city’s airport.

The driver of the third blew himself up while being pursued, it said, “killing a number of civilians, injuring others, and causing material damage to public and private properties.”

Yara, 23, who lives near Tahrir Square, said her apartment had been rattled by the blast. “It was like war had returned after we felt that it had faded away,” she said. “I haven’t left the house yet today – I’m not afraid any more, but I just want to do nothing today.”

Hours after the blast, security was still tight at checkpoints around the city centre although local authorities had reopened some streets leading to Tahrir Square.



Damascus has been spared the large-scale battles that have devastated other major Syrian cities during the country’s six-year civil war but dozens of people have been killed in bombings, usually on the outskirts.

In March, two suicide bomb attacks in Damascus killed several dozen people, most of them at the Palace of Justice courthouse near the Old City. Islamic State claimed responsibility for that attack.



Also in March, a double suicide attack in the capital killed scores of people, most of them Iraqi Shia pilgrims. That attack was claimed by the Tahrir al-Sham alliance of Islamist insurgents, which is spearheaded by a jihadist group formerly known as the Nusra Front.

Syrian government forces, which have defeated rebel fighters in several suburbs of Damascus over the last year, are currently fighting in the Jobar and Ain Tarma areas on the capital’s eastern outskirts. </s> BEIRUT — An explosion outside an office belonging to an al Qaeda-linked group in the country’s northwestern on Friday killed at least 11 people and wounded several others, opposition activists said.

The blast comes a week after members of the al Qaeda-linked Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, Arabic for Levant Liberation Committee, or HTS, took over control of wide parts of Idlib province and the surrounding countryside after forcing rival insurgents to accept a deal for a civil administration run by HTS in their areas.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and Smart news agency, an activist collective, said the blast occurred on the southern edge of the rebel-held city of Idlib.

The Observatory said 11 people were killed in the blast, including seven HTS members. Smart said 12 people were killed, many of them militants.

In the country’s east, an air strike in the last area held by the Islamic State killed at least 20 people in the village of Baghouz, according to the state news agency SANA. The Observatory said 23 people were killed including 10 Islamic State members.

They both blamed the U.S.-led coalition that has been providing air cover to the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in their months-long offensive to capture the area from extremists near the Iraqi border.

Meanwhile in Turkey, President Tayyip Erdogan met with U.S. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham to discuss the situation in Syria as the United States prepares to withdraw troops.

Graham, a prominent voice on foreign affairs in the U.S., met with Erdogan and other Turkish officials Friday for talks that were also expected to include a proposal for the creation of a “safe zone” in northeast Syria.

The visit comes days after a suicide bombing, claimed by Islamic State, killed two U.S. service members and two American civilians in the northeastern town of Manbij. </s> An explosion of unknown origin at a weapons depot Sunday in the northwestern Syrian province of Idlib killed at least 69 civilians including 17 children, in addition to scores of injuries.

Mustafa Hajj Yusuf, the head of Idlib Civil Defense, earlier acknowledged the death toll at least as 39 dead and 45 injured. He later told Anadolu Agency that search and rescue operation was concluded as of Monday morning and 17 civilians, mostly women and children, were pulled under the rubble. The number of the injured stands at 50.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also confirmed the casualty toll on Monday.

An AFP correspondent at the site in the opposition-held town of Sarmada near the Turkish border said the explosion caused two buildings to collapse.

On Sunday morning, rescue workers used a bulldozer to remove rubble and extract trapped people, the correspondent said.

Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor, earlier said the death toll could rise as dozens were still missing.

"The explosion occurred in a weapons depot in a residential building in Sarmada," the head of the Britain based monitor said. But the cause of the blast was "not yet clear", Abdel Rahman added.

A rescue worker carried the motionless body of a small child from the wreckage to an ambulance, the AFP correspondent said.

Behind mounds of rubble, the facade of a building was scorched black, due to a fire after the blast.

A civil defense source told AFP that women and children were among the dead.

But rescue workers had pulled out "five people who were still alive", the source said.

Most of Idlib is controlled by Turkish backed opposition fighters, while parts of it are controlled by terrorist groups led by al-Qaida linked Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, but the Daesh terror group also has sleeper cells in the area.

In recent months, a series of explosions and assassinations -- mainly targeting opposition officials and fighters -- have rocked the province.

While some attacks have been claimed by Daesh, most are the result of infighting since last year between various other groups.

In recent days, regime forces have ramped up their deadly bombardment of southern Idlib and sent reinforcements to nearby areas they control.

Bashar al-Assad has warned that regime forces intend to retake Idlib, after his regime regained control of swathes of opposition held territory elsewhere.

Around 2.5 million people live in the province, half of them displaced by fighting in other parts of the country.

More than 350,000 people have been killed and millions displaced since Syria's civil war started in 2011 with the brutal repression of anti-government protests.
A massive explosion targetting a Tahrir al-Sham base in Idlib kills 15 people and wounds 20 others. A car bomb is reported to have been used in the attack.