Middle East crisis live: thousands of people flee Homs in central Syria as rebel forces push on | World news

Thousands of people fled the center Syrian city ​​of Homs overnight and into Friday morning, a military monitor and residents said, as rebel forces tried to push their blitzkrieg offensive against government forces further south.

They have already captured the key cities of Aleppo to the north and Hama in the center, dealing successive crushing blows to the President Bashar al-Assadnearly 14 years after protests erupted against him across Syria.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rightsa Great Britaina based military monitor said thousands of people began fleeing on Thursday night to Syria’s western coastal areas, a government stronghold.

According to Reuters, a resident of the coastal region said thousands of people had started arriving there from Homs, fearing a rapid advance by the rebels.

on friday morning Israeli airstrikes hit two border posts between Lebanon and Syria, Minister of Transport of Lebanon, Ali Hamiehsaid.

This was reported by the Syrian state news agency Sanaa Arida border crossing with Lebanon was out of service due to the attack. Israel’s military said it attacked overnight arms transfer centers and infrastructure on the Syrian side of the Lebanese border, saying those routes were used by the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah for arms smuggling.

Russian bombing at night also destroyed Rustic bridge on the key M5 motorwayto prevent rebels from using this main route to the city of Homs, a Syrian army officer told Reuters.

“There were at least eight strikes on the bridge,” he added. Government forces are working to strengthen positions around the city of Homs with new reinforcements, he said.

Rebels led by the Islamist faction Hayat Tahrir al-Sham had promised to continue on to the central city of Homs, a crossroads city that connects the capital Damascus in the north and Assad’s heartland along the coast.

“Your time has come,” a rebel operations room said in an online post, urging Homs residents to rise up in revolution.

More on that in a bit, but first, here are some of the other latest developments:

• The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of sources inside Syria, said 826 people, mostly fighters but including 111 civilians, had been killed in the country since violence erupted last week. These are the most intense battles of 2020. since the civil war sparked by the crackdown on pro-democracy protests in 2011.

• Iran claims it has carried out a successful space launch, the latest in its program that the West says is improving Tehran’s ballistic missile program. Iran conducted the launch using its Simorgh program, a satellite-carrying missile that has suffered a series of failed launches. The launch took place at Iran’s Imam Khomeini Spaceport in Semnan province. There was no immediate independent confirmation Friday that the launch was successful.

• Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein will meet his Syrian and Iranian counterparts on Friday to discuss the situation in Syriathe Iraqi state news agency reported on Thursday.

• A Hamas official said Thursday that international mediators have resumed talks with the armed groups and Israel on a Gaza ceasefireand that he hopes a deal to end the 14-month war is close. Ceasefire talks broke down last month when Qatar suspended talks with mediators from Egypt and the US out of frustration at the lack of progress between Israel and Hamas.

• Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said he plans to hold talks on Friday with Turkish and Iranian officials about the situation in Syria. On Thursday, Lavrov said Moscow was “very concerned” by the recent escalation of violence in Syria.