Rebels cut Damascus-Baghdad Road, down planes in E. Qalamoun

DOWN IN DUMAYR: Pro-opposition Orient News broadcast a report Wednesday claiming fighters had cut government supply routes from Iraq near the town of a-Dumayr in the eastern Qalamoun mountain range, roughly 38 kilometers northeast of the Syrian capital.

“Advanced operations [are underway] on Qalamoun’s eastern flank, during which revolutionaries claimed control of the resupply route” connecting Baghdad with the Syrian capital, says the broadcaster.

Set against images of rebel fighters running toward army installations, Orient reports Free Syrian Army troops staged “a surprise attack on regime barracks,” destroying two military checkpoints to the east of a-Dumayr and claiming artillery and other arms.

“Among the operation’s most important outcomes was the cutting off of the ‘Baghdad-Petra’ highway,” the broadcaster explains, “passes near all cities and towns of Qalamoun to the west [of a-Dumayr] and Damascus to the south.”

The report goes on to note rebels’ claims that they had destroyed three MiG jets flying over a-Dumayr airport, as shown in additional video footage published by opposition sources Sunday.

The opposition gains in the eastern Qalamoun mountain range come as part of a campaign heralded as “Desert Hurricanes” by rebel fighters last Wednesday,

Video courtesy of Free Syria 2011.

-April 28, 2014

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