The deployment demonstrates the group's complete commitment to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and may profoundly affect the 26-month conflict.
“The Aleppo battle has started on a very small scale; we’ve only just entered the game,” a senior Hezbollah commander told The Post. “We are going to go after strongholds where they think they are safe. They are going to fall like dominoes.”
The commander had been overseeing five units in Qusair, a town near the Syria-Lebanon on border where Hezbollah has been spearheading a regime offensive to retake the town for the last three weeks.
The increased presence of the militant group, in addition to the arrival of sophisticated military technology such as Iranian surveillance drones and Russian anti-mortar systems, has helped solidify recent gains made by forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
(Meanwhile, The U.S. is witholding millions pledged to helped the Syrian opposition.)
Hezbollah's preparations to attack Aleppo, which is nowhere near the Lebanon-Syria border, significantly raises the stakes in the war.
“A deployment so deep into Syria and in such a crucial place would be a clear indication that Hezbollah’s role in Syria was never limited to defensive aims but is geared toward helping Assad score major victories,” Emile Hokayem, a Middle East-based analyst at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, told the Post.
Aleppo is Syria's largest city and served as the country's commercial hub before the war.
David Barrett of The Telegraph reports that the metropolitan population, about three million before the war, has grown to about 3.5 million since the opposition seized half the city last July.
Rebels, primarily al-Qaeda-affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra, have been administering city services in areas under their control while a stalemate persists.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/hezbollah-is-preparing-to-attack-aleppo-2013-6#ixzz35cGPhzgO
“The Aleppo battle has started on a very small scale; we’ve only just entered the game,” a senior Hezbollah commander told The Post. “We are going to go after strongholds where they think they are safe. They are going to fall like dominoes.”
The commander had been overseeing five units in Qusair, a town near the Syria-Lebanon on border where Hezbollah has been spearheading a regime offensive to retake the town for the last three weeks.
The increased presence of the militant group, in addition to the arrival of sophisticated military technology such as Iranian surveillance drones and Russian anti-mortar systems, has helped solidify recent gains made by forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
(Meanwhile, The U.S. is witholding millions pledged to helped the Syrian opposition.)
Hezbollah's preparations to attack Aleppo, which is nowhere near the Lebanon-Syria border, significantly raises the stakes in the war.
“A deployment so deep into Syria and in such a crucial place would be a clear indication that Hezbollah’s role in Syria was never limited to defensive aims but is geared toward helping Assad score major victories,” Emile Hokayem, a Middle East-based analyst at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, told the Post.
Aleppo is Syria's largest city and served as the country's commercial hub before the war.
David Barrett of The Telegraph reports that the metropolitan population, about three million before the war, has grown to about 3.5 million since the opposition seized half the city last July.
Rebels, primarily al-Qaeda-affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra, have been administering city services in areas under their control while a stalemate persists.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/hezbollah-is-preparing-to-attack-aleppo-2013-6#ixzz35cGPhzgO
