Syria captures rebel base in key city of Homs

Oren Dorell | USA TODAY

The Syrian military said Monday that it has captured a rebel stronghold in the city of Homs, which rebel forces had held for more than a year, raising questions about whether U.S. military aid is coming too late for the uprising against dictator Bashar Assad.

Any small arms that President Obama has said he wants to send rebel forces will not prevent Assad forces' from overtaking the city, which is the birthplace of the revolution against Assad, says Elizabeth O'Bagy, a Syria analyst at the Institute for the Study of War.

"For the battle for Homs, any program to send weapons from the U.S. will come too late," O'Bagy said. "Rebels are entrenched in a few strongholds in the city and really don't have the capacity to come back in any shape or form and will have to decide whether to withdraw or be all killed.

"It is likely the opposition will begin to withdraw from Homs and retreat into the countryside where they have more freedom to operate, as they've done in the past," she said.

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki confirmed that Assad's forces and his Lebanese shiite militia allies made gains in Homs, but said their longevity is questionable.

"While it is true regime forces and Hezbollah took territory in the city Homs, it remains to be seen if they'll be able to hold it," Psaki said Monday. "Despite the onslaught, rebels continue to retain control in the outskirts of Homs."

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights activist group, however, denied that regime forces had seized all of the district of Khaldiyeh, which is where the rebels were entrenched in Homs. The group said there was still scattered fighting in southern areas of the neighborhood.

Syrian TV aired footage from the district showing troops roaming deserted streets and waving flags in front of shell-scarred buildings.

Government troops launched a broad offensive to retake rebel-held areas of Homs, Syria's third-largest city, a month ago. The city is a crossroads for the main highway from Damascus to the north as well as to the coastal region that is a stronghold of Assad's Alawite sect.

The district of Khaldiyeh had a population of about 80,000, but only about 2,000 remain there today as residents fled the violence, activists say. The heavy fighting over the past two years has caused extensive damage. Some buildings have been reduced to rubble.

In a report on Monday, Syrian state TV said "the Syrian army has restored security and stability in the whole neighborhood of Khaldiyeh in Homs."

Obama announced last month that he had decided to help arm the rebels after two years of fighting to ensure that they are not wiped out by Assad's forces. He has said he wants a political solution in which both sides agree to a transition of power from Assad.

But Assad has not agreed to renounce power and the rebels have said they need heavy weaponry to survive, such as anti-tank weapons, and also a no-fly zone imposed by Western air forces to stop Assad's unchallenged bombardments of rebel cities.

O'Bagy pointed out that in March 2012, after a major government push in Baba Amr, rebels held on as long as they could before retreating, O'Bagy said. Then they waited until the bulk of regime forces moved on to another hot spot until they could move back into the city.

By psychologically, losing Homs "will have a very big impact on the opposition" because Homs is the birthplace of the revolution, she said.

"This will cut off most of their lines of communications and make it difficult for the northern and southern opposition forces to coordinate the plans together. The two sides have been operating separately but this will make it even more so."

O'Bagy said the rebels will continue to operate in the south of Syria, where they use more guerrilla tactics.

In the northern city of Aleppo, several rebel factions including the al-Qaeda-linked Jabhat al-Nusra, or Nusra Front, attacked army posts in two neighborhoods in a an offensive titled "amputating infidels" the Observatory said.

It said rebels captured several buildings in the neighborhoods of Dahret Abed Rabbo and Lairamoun, and that eight government soldiers were killed.

"I don't think he's on the way to regaining control of the country," O'Bagy said of Assad.

In recent days rebels moved into Damascus and made limited gains in Aleppo, "enough to show the regime cannot conclusively retake all the country," she said.

Contributing: The Associated Press