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Iran, Hezbollah Aim to Bolster Syria’s Assad as Rebels Bear Down on Homs
People stand near a damaged vehicle, after rebels led by HTS have sought to capitalize on their swift takeover of Aleppo in the north and Hama in west-central Syria by pressing onwards to Homs, in Hama, Syria, Dec. 6, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Hasano
Iran will send missiles, drones, and more advisers to Syria, a senior Iranian official said on Friday as rebel forces advanced on the central city of Homs and Kurds seized the biggest city in the east, jolting President Bashar al-Assad‘s grip on power.
If Islamist insurgents captured Homs in their lightning new offensive, it would cut off the 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.
In a further setback for Assad, a US-backed alliance led by Syrian Kurdish fighters has taken Deri el-Zor, the government’s main foothold in the vast desert east of the country, three Syrian sources told Reuters on Friday.
It was the third major city, after Aleppo and Hama in the northwest and center, to fall out of Assad‘s control in a week.
Piling on the pressure, an Iraqi security source said the Syrian Kurds were also advancing in the direction of the town of Albukamal on Syria’s far eastern border with Iraq and could take it within the next 24 hours.
After years locked behind frozen front lines, rebel forces 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 key allies — Russia, Iran, and Lebanon’s Hezbollah terrorist group — came to his rescue. But all have recently been weakened and diverted by other crises, giving 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 the Assad family’s 54-year authoritarian rule.
SURPRISE OFFENSIVE
The rebels‘ sweep has taken the region by surprise and emboldened other opponents of Assad. Syrian rebel commander Hassan Abdul Ghany urged top military officers to defect, in a video statement aired on Friday.
Jordan has closed its only passenger and commercial border crossing with Syria, the interior ministry said on Friday.
Armed groups have been firing at Syria’s Nassib border crossing with Jordan, a Syrian army source told Reuters.
Iran has been focused on tensions with its arch-enemy Israel since the Gaza war erupted in October 2023.
“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 senior Iranian official said on condition of anonymity.
“Now, Tehran is providing intelligence and satellite support to Syria.”
The Israeli military said it was reinforcing aerial and ground forces in the Golan Heights in southwest Syria and was prepared for all scenarios.
Iran-backed 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.
But Israel has seriously weakened Hezbollah in fighting in Lebanon this year, assassinating its top officials and devastating its military infrastructure.
HTS rebels said they had also taken over the towns of Talbisa and Rastan, bringing them within miles (km) of Homs.
The Syrian military said there was no truth to reports it had withdrawn from Homs, saying in a statement it was deployed along “steady and solid defense lines” there.
A resident of Homs earlier said the offices of Syria’s main security branches there had emptied, with members exiting 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 largely deserted while pro-government militia groups patrolled the area.
ISLAMIC STATE
In another alarming development for Assad, the head of the US-backed Syrian Kurdish force said the radical Islamic State group, which imposed a reign of terror over swathes of Iraq and Syria before its defeat by a US-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 reporters, referring to areas in Syria’s east.
Rebels led by HTS have sought to capitalize on their swift takeover of Aleppo in the north and Hama in west-central Syria by pressing onward 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.
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Iranian Media Claims Obtaining ‘Sensitive’ Israeli Intelligence Materials
FILE PHOTO: The atomic symbol and the Iranian flag are seen in this illustration, July 21, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
i24 News – Iranian and Iran-affiliated media claimed on Saturday that the Islamic Republic had obtained a trove of “strategic and sensitive” Israeli intelligence materials related to Israel’s nuclear facilities and defense plans.
“Iran’s intelligence apparatus has obtained a vast quantity of strategic and sensitive information and documents belonging to the Zionist regime,” Iran’s state broadcaster said, referring to Israel in the manner accepted in those Muslim or Arab states that don’t recognize its legitimacy. The statement was also relayed by the Lebanese site Al-Mayadeen, affiliated with the Iran-backed jihadists of Hezbollah.
The reports did not include any details on the documents or how Iran had obtained them.
The intelligence reportedly included “thousands of documents related to that regime’s nuclear plans and facilities,” it added.
According to the reports, “the data haul was extracted during a covert operation and included a vast volume of materials including documents, images, and videos.”
The report comes amid high tensions over Iran’s nuclear program, over which it is in talks with the US administration of President Donald Trump.
Iranian-Israeli tensions reached an all-time high since the October 7 massacre and the subsequent Gaza war, including Iranian rocket fire on Israel and Israeli aerial raids in Iran that devastated much of the regime’s air defenses.
Israel, which regards the prospect of the antisemitic mullah regime obtaining a nuclear weapon as an existential threat, has indicated it could resort to a military strike against Iran’s installations should talks fail to curb uranium enrichment.
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Israel Retrieves Body of Thai Hostage from Gaza
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz looks on, amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, in Jerusalem, Nov. 7, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
The Israeli military has retrieved the body of a Thai hostage who had been held in Gaza since Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack, Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Saturday.
Nattapong Pinta’s body was held by a Palestinian terrorist group called the Mujahedeen Brigades, and was recovered from the area of Rafah in southern Gaza, Katz said. His family in Thailand has been notified.
Pinta, an agricultural worker, was abducted from Kibbutz Nir Oz, a small Israeli community near the Gaza border where a quarter of the population was killed or taken hostage during the Hamas attack that triggered the devastating war in Gaza.
Israel’s military said Pinta had been abducted alive and killed by his captors, who had also killed and taken to Gaza the bodies of two more Israeli-American hostages that were retrieved earlier this week.
There was no immediate comment from the Mujahedeen Brigades, who have previously denied killing their captives, or from Hamas. The Israeli military said the Brigades were still holding the body of another foreign national. Only 20 of the 55 remaining hostages are believed to still be alive.
The Mujahedeen Brigades also held and killed Israeli hostage Shiri Bibas and her two young sons, according to Israeli authorities. Their bodies were returned during a two-month ceasefire, which collapsed in March after the two sides could not agree on terms for extending it to a second phase.
Israel has since expanded its offensive across the Gaza Strip as US, Qatari and Egyptian-led efforts to secure another ceasefire have faltered.
US-BACKED AID GROUP HALTS DISTRIBUTIONS
The United Nations has warned that most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is at risk of famine after an 11-week Israeli blockade of the enclave, with the rate of young children suffering from acute malnutrition nearly tripling.
Aid distribution was halted on Friday after the US-and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation said overcrowding had made it unsafe to continue operations. It was unclear whether aid had resumed on Saturday.
The GHF began distributing food packages in Gaza at the end of May, overseeing a new model of aid distribution which the United Nations says is neither impartial nor neutral. It says it has provided around 9 million meals so far.
The Israeli military said on Saturday that 350 trucks of humanitarian aid belonging to U.N. and other international relief groups were transferred this week via the Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza.
The war erupted after Hamas-led terrorists took 251 hostages and killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, in the October 7, 2023 attack, Israel’s single deadliest day.
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US Mulls Giving Millions to Controversial Gaza Aid Foundation, Sources Say
Palestinians carry aid supplies which they received from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in the central Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ramadan Abed/File Photo
The State Department is weighing giving $500 million to the new foundation providing aid to war-shattered Gaza, according to two knowledgeable sources and two former US officials, a move that would involve the US more deeply in a controversial aid effort that has been beset by violence and chaos.
The sources and former US officials, all of whom requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, said that money for Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) would come from the US Agency for International Development (USAID), which is being folded into the US State Department.
The plan has met resistance from some US officials concerned with the deadly shootings of Palestinians near aid distribution sites and the competence of the GHF, the two sources said.
The GHF, which has been fiercely criticized by humanitarian organizations, including the United Nations, for an alleged lack of neutrality, began distributing aid last week amid warnings that most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is at risk of famine after an 11-week Israeli aid blockade, which was lifted on May 19 when limited deliveries were allowed to resume.
The foundation has seen senior personnel quit and had to pause handouts twice this week after crowds overwhelmed its distribution hubs.
The State Department and GHF did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Reuters has been unable to establish who is currently funding the GHF operations, which began in Gaza last week. The GHF uses private US security and logistics companies to transport aid into Gaza for distribution at so-called secure distribution sites.
On Thursday, Reuters reported that a Chicago-based private equity firm, McNally Capital, has an “economic interest” in the for-profit US contractor overseeing the logistics and security of GHF’s aid distribution hubs in the enclave.
While US President Donald Trump’s administration and Israel say they don’t finance the GHF operation, both have been pressing the United Nations and international aid groups to work with it.
The US and Israel argue that aid distributed by a long-established U.N. aid network was diverted to Hamas. Hamas has denied that.
USAID has been all but dismantled. Some 80 percent of its programs have been canceled and its staff face termination as part of President Donald Trump’s drive to align US foreign policy with his “America First” agenda.
One source with knowledge of the matter and one former senior official said the proposal to give the $500 million to GHF has been championed by acting deputy USAID Administrator Ken Jackson, who has helped oversee the agency’s dismemberment.
The source said that Israel requested the funds to underwrite GHF’s operations for 180 days.
The Israeli government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The two sources said that some US officials have concerns with the plan because of the overcrowding that has affected the aid distribution hubs run by GHF’s contractor, and violence nearby.
Those officials also want well-established non-governmental organizations experienced in running aid operations in Gaza and elsewhere to be involved in the operation if the State Department approves the funds for GHF, a position that Israel likely will oppose, the sources said.
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