Turkey sends military reinforcements to the outskirts of Manbij and Tal Rifaat

The Syrian Democratic Forces are preparing for a possible Turkish attack.

AFP

A military commander in the Syrian National Army, the opposition loyal to Turkey, confirmed that military reinforcements for the Turkish army, including tanks, artillery and troop carriers, arrived on Friday and Saturday evening to the contact lines with the Tel Rifaat area in the northern countryside of Aleppo and the Manbij front east of Aleppo.

The military commander said in a statement to the German news agency: "The instructions from the National Army Staff Command were issued on Friday to raise the combat readiness of all factions on the contact lines with the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in the countryside of Aleppo, Raqqa and Hasaka, waiting for the zero hour."

The military commander described the military operation that Turkey announced to implement in northern Syria as being quick and swift, saying: “We know that the majority of the (SDF) forces are from the Arab component, and these will stand by their people and want to get rid of the rule of the PKK elements.” "The fortifications that the SDF is doing will not benefit them, because the areas will fall from within."

Well-informed sources in the Syrian opposition, who asked not to be named, revealed to DPA that "Turkey has fulfilled all the conditions to implement a military operation in northern Syria, starting from the areas of Tal Rifaat and Manbij in the northern and eastern countryside of Aleppo, and the military operation may start in Any moment, but most likely it will be launched after Eid al-Adha, which falls next Saturday, while some Turkish sources talk about launching it after the middle of this month, following the visit of the US President to the region.

The sources considered that the visit of the Iranian Foreign Minister, Amir Hossein Abdollahian, to Damascus, aimed to put the Syrian regime on the results of his visit a few days ago to Turkey, in which he announced that Iran understands Turkey’s security concerns, but what he announced later in Damascus that his country rejects any Turkish military action. In Syria, messages are exchanged, and Iran has distinguished relations with the Syrian government and Turkey.

Since the beginning of last month, Turkey and the opposition factions loyal to it have started preparing for a military operation in northern Syria, imposing a safe zone, as Turkey calls it, 30 km deep from the Syrian-Turkish border, and expelling the militants of the Syrian Democratic Forces.

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