Iran, Hezbollah aim to bolster Assad as rebels bear down on Homs

Iran will send missiles, drones and more advisers to Syria, a senior Iranian official said on Friday, as rebel forces pushed their lightning offensive south towards the city of Homs in the biggest challenge for years to President Bashar al-Assad's rule.

Seizing Homs would cut off Syria's capital Damascus from the coast, a longtime redoubt of Assad's minority Alawite sect and where his Russian allies have a naval base and air base.

After years locked behind frozen front lines, the insurgents have burst out of their northwestern Idlib bastion to achieve the swiftest battlefield advance by either side since a street uprising against Assad mushroomed into civil war 13 years ago.

Assad regained control of most of Syria after his key allies - Russia, Iran and Lebanon's Hezbollah group - came to his support. But all have recently been diverted by other crises, giving Syrian Sunni Muslim militants a window to fight back.

The head of the Syrian faction leading the sweeping assault told CNN that his group - a former Al-Qaeda affiliate now known as Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) - aimed to "build Syria" and bring Syrian refugees back home from Lebanon and Europe.

It was Abu Mohammed Al-Golani's first interview since his group began seizing territory from Assad's forces on Nov. 27. Rebels have captured two major cities so far and are now thrusting toward the key crossroads city of Homs.

HTS broke from Al-Qaeda in 2016, says it poses no threat to the West and has spent years trying to moderate its image, presenting itself as a viable alternative to Assad.

Iran has been focused on tensions with its arch-enemy Israel since the Gaza war erupted in October 2023. The two sides have exchanged fire, after decades of shadow warfare.

"It is likely that Tehran will need to send military equipment, missiles and drones to Syria... Tehran has taken all necessary steps to increase the number of its military advisers in Syria and deploy forces," the official said, on condition of anonymity.

"Now, Tehran is providing intelligence and satellite support to Syria."

Hezbollah, meanwhile, sent a small number of "supervising forces" from Lebanon to Syria overnight to help prevent anti-government fighters from seizing Homs, two senior Lebanese security sources told Reuters.

A Syrian military officer and two regional officials close to Tehran also told Reuters that elite forces from Iran-backed Hezbollah had crossed from Lebanon overnight and had taken up positions in Homs.

HTS rebels said they had taken over the towns of Talbisa and Rastan, bringing them within miles (km) of Homs.

HOMS EMPTYING

A resident of Homs said the offices of Syria's main security branches there emptied on Friday morning, with members leaving the city.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based monitoring group, said thousands of people had begun fleeing from Homs on Thursday night towards the Mediterranean coastal regions of Latakia and Tartus, strongholds of the government.

A coastal resident said thousands of people had begun arriving there from Homs, fearing the rebels' rapid advance.

Wasim Marouh, a Homs resident who decided not to leave, said most of its main commercial streets were empty while pro-government militia groups patrolled the streets.

In another alarming development for Assad, the head of the US-backed Syrian Kurdish force said the radical Islamic State group, which ran a reign of terror in swathes of Iraq and Syria till its defeat by a U.S.-led coalition in 2017, had now taken control of some areas in eastern Syria.

"Due to the recent developments, there is increased movement by Islamic State mercenaries in the Syrian desert, in the south and west of Deir Al-Zor and the countryside of al-Raqqa," Mazloum Abdi told a press conference, referring to areas in the east of the country.

'YOUR TIME HAS COME'

Rebels led by HTS have sought to capitalise on their swift takeover of Aleppo in the north and Hama in west-central Syria by pressing onwards to Homs, another 40 km (24 miles) south.

A rebel operations room urged Homs residents in an online post to rise up, saying: "Your time has come."

Russian bombing overnight destroyed the Rastan bridge along the M5 highway, the main route to Homs, to prevent rebels using it to advance, a Syrian army officer told Reuters.

Government forces were bringing reinforcements to positions around Homs, he added.

Assad relied heavily on Russian and Iranian military backing during the most intense years of the civil war, helping him to claw back most territory and Syria's largest cities before front lines hardened in 2020.

But Russia has been focused on its invasion of Ukraine since 2022. And many in the top leadership of Hezbollah, the most powerful Iran-aligned militia force, were killed by Israel over the past two months.