Fighting in northwest Syria kill scores of fighters
None
Syrian government forces and insurgents fought fierce battles that left dozens dead in the country's northwest Friday as troops tried to regain control of two villages they lost earlier this month, state media and an opposition war monitor said.
Syrian state news agency SANA said the army carried out "intense rocket and artillery strikes" on insurgent positions on the front line in the central province of Hama and nearby Idlib that is the last major rebel stronghold in Syria's civil war, now In its ninth year.
SANA said the aim of the bombing is to destroy fortifications built by insurgents, many of them members of the al-Qaida-linked Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS. It said the strikes were mostly near the villages of Jubayn and Tel Milh adding that they inflicted many casualties among the insurgents.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, said troops were trying to capture the villages of Jubayn and Tel Milh launching an offensive around dawn Friday. The group said during Friday's fighting alone, 51 troops and pro-government gunmen were killed as well as 45 insurgents.
Syrian government forces launched an offensive against the rebel-held territory in late April, leading to the collapse of a cease-fire negotiated by Turkey and Russia last year.
