Muna Ali, Baladi News
Regime forces backed by multinational sectarian militias along with Hezbollah militia launched on Sunday a massive attack on the city of Daraa with unprecedented air cover by the Russian air force. The attack targeted the strategical neighborhood of al-Manshiyah along with Daraa al-Balad and other rebel-controlled neighborhoods.
Despite that Daraa is one of the four regions included in the de-escalation agreement, regime and its allies are trying to make a primitive step by demarking those regions in order to make a change on ground to impose new maps. This can explain delaying "Astana 5" as Russia has given the regime extra time to impose this change on Daraa before applying the de-escalation agreement.
Ali Haidar, minister of reconciliation in Assad's government said that the northern countryside of Homs which is included in the de-escalation agreement will witness some reconciliations and this means occupying the region, displacing its people and rebels towards the Syrian north.
Military analysts confirm that the steadfastness of Daraa rebels till the 12th of July is the only thing that can save the governorate and Turkey is the only country that is able to prevent Russia from delaying the conference once again as its one of the three guarantors of the agreement and the only country representing the Syrian opposition.
The battles in al-Manshiya neighborhood that went on for months, where the rebels managed to liberate the whole neighborhood enhances the rebels chances in the upcoming battle as they proved efficiency, calmness and perfect planning and on top of all a military unity that made them all fight under one flag and one plan which is the most important factor that was missing on the fronts where rebels have lost previous battles.