BEIRUT: Thousands of people fled the central Syrian city of Homs overnight and into Friday morning, a war monitoring group and residents said, as rebel forces continued their lightning offensive against government forces further south. wanted to increase
They have already captured the key cities of Aleppo in the north and Hama in the center, dealing successive blows to President Bashar al-Assad, nearly 14 years after protests erupted across Syria.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based monitoring group, said thousands of people had started fleeing to the western coastal areas, a government stronghold, on Thursday night.
A resident of the coastal area said that thousands of people have started arriving there from Homs, fearing the rapid advance of the rebels.
A Syrian army officer told Reuters that during the advance, Russian bombing overnight destroyed the Rastan bridge to prevent rebels from using the key M5 highway, the main route to Homs.
“There were at least eight attacks on the bridge,” he added. He said government forces were bringing reinforcements to positions around the city.
Rebels led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham fighting group have vowed to push south toward Homs, a strait city that connects the capital Damascus to the north and Assad’s heartland.
The rebels’ operations room urged Homs residents to rise up in an online post, saying: “Your time has come.”