Syrian rebel forces in Hama / Ghaith Alsayed / AP / Profimedia
Panicked residents of Damascus rushed to buy food and medicine on Saturday as shops closed their doors after rebels announced they had begun encircling the Syrian capital, AFP reports.
In Jaramana, a suburb of Damascus, some protesters tore down statues of former president Hafez al-Assad, the father of the current head of state.
“I am very afraid, for me and for my unborn baby girl,” said Rania, a resident of Damascus, eight months pregnant, who could not find the medicine she needed because the pharmacies had already closed.
“I tried this morning to find medicine, but I couldn’t,” she told AFP, adding that she returned home empty-handed at her husband’s insistence.
“It wasn’t like that when I came out this morning. Suddenly, everyone is scared,” he added.
The Syrian army said on Saturday it was strengthening defense lines around the capital Damascus and in the south of the country, as panic spread in the capital after rebels said they were closing in on the city .
Rebels arriving from the south announced on Saturday that they had begun encircling Damascus. One of its leaders, Hassan Abdel Ghani, said this afternoon that the fighters were less than 20 kilometers from the southern entrance to the city.
Interior Minister Mohammed al-Rahmun said a “very solid” security cordon had been set up to protect the capital, while the army said it was strengthening its defense lines, particularly around Damascus.
“Our units are reinforcing their lines around Damascus and in the south of the country,” a spokesman for the army’s general command said in a televised statement. He said the army was launching operations against the rebels in the “rural areas of Hama and Homs and in the northern area of ​​Deraa”, a city in the south.
The offensive by rebels led by the radical Islamist group Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) began on November 27 in northwestern Syria, before the fighters seized vast territories, including major cities, within days. Aleppo, from the north, and Hama.
In central Damascus, residents rushed to ATMs to withdraw cash as a rare wave of panic gripped the city, residents told AFP.
In a video statement announcing the military campaign, Colonel Hassan Abdulghany of the rebel forces described the operation as a “defensive necessity”.
“To return fire on our people, this operation is not a choice. It is mandatory to defend our people and our land,” he said, quoted by The New York Times. “It has become clear to everyone that the regime militias and their allies, including Iranian mercenaries, have declared an open war against the Syrian people,” he added.
