With the firearm-fall of Al-Sukhnah under the control of the regime using their heavy fire and the withdrawal of ISIS of the last city under its control in Homs Province, the fighting continues on other areas linked to it geographically and militarily in the eastern countryside of Hama and the eastern countryside of Al-Raqqah, near the southern banks of the Euphrates, between the regime forces and their allied militiamen, of Syrian and non-Syrian nationalities and tribal forces trained and armed by the Russians on one hand and ISIS on the other. The clashes are taking place under the intensive aerial and artillery shelling by the Russian warplanes, causing more casualties at both sides.

The SOHR has documented since the 17th of July 2017, the date in which the regime forces ended the presence of ISIS in the western part of the southern countryside of Al-Raqqah, until today, the 29th, the death of tens of members of both parties to the fighting taking place in the Syrian dessert. On one hand, the number of fatalities among the regime forces and their allied militiamen, of Syrian and non-Syrian nationalities, rose to at least 139, including at least 23 officers, as a result of the bombings, shelling and clashes with ISIS. On the other hand, the number of ISIS members and field commanders who were killed in aerial raids, intensive artillery and rocket shelling and in clashes with the regime forces and their allied militiamen rose to 174 at least.

The SOHR published on Friday, the 28th of July 2017, that ISIS carried out a series of withdrawals from Al-Sukhnah city, which was considered the last city under its control in Homs Province. Cross sources confirmed to the SOHR that most of ISIS members withdrew from the city after the regime forces and their allied militiamen, of Syrian and non-Syrian nationalities, managed less than 24 hours before that date to reach the outskirts of the city. ISIS members started to withdraw when the city fell under the regime’s fire following the intensive shelling that the city had been witnessing for 50 days. The regime had lost the city to ISIS in the first half of 2015 when the latter carried out a violent attack on the city and vast areas of Palmyra desert and city.

When the regime forces advance during the coming few hours into Al-Sukhnah city, they would be less than 40 km away from the administrative border between Al-Raqqah and the north of Al-Sukhnah to execute the full encirclement operation of ISIS over an area of thousands of kilometers west of the encirclement line set till Sha’er area and the eastern countryside of Hama. This would only leave ISIS with two choices: either to fight till the end or to carry out another broad withdrawal operation of thousands of Kilometers towards Deir Ezzor before the regime forces manage to fully encircle them under aerial coverage by the Russian and the regime’ warplanes and with the support of their allied militiamen, of Syrian and non-Syrian militiamen.

Deir Ezzor Province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights: a man died of injuries sustained in shelling by ISIS yesterday on areas in the regime-controlled Al-Qosur neighborhood in Deir Ezzor city.