The rapid breakthroughs made by the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) in Syria reveal that the supporters of President Bashar al-Assad are distracted, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday.
The key allies of al-Assad, mainly Russia, Iran, and the pro-Iranian Hezbollah militia in Lebanon, have all in “different ways” been distracted, Blinken said.
Russia for its part is occupied with the ongoing war in Ukraine, while Hezbollah has been engaged in a war with Israel in Lebanon, which only recently resulted in a ceasefire.
“It looks like HTS took advantage of that fact,” he added while calling for a de-escalation in fighting and for civilians not to be harmed.
Blinken added that because al-Assad has refused to engage with the UN political process to end the civil war in Syria this also “opened the door” to the attacks by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.
