The Battle of Qalamoun was started on 15 November 2013 by the Syrian Army to cut rebel supply lines to Damascus from Lebanon.
The strategic region had been used by rebel forces as a rear base for its operations around the capital Damascus. More ever the rebels viewed the vast Qalamoun mountains as key to their efforts to eventually take over the Syrian capital Damascus.
As the Syrian army pushed on, rebel held cities, towns and villages fell one after the other. The last major town in the Qalamoun region was Yabroud. The town fell after a blistering assault by the combined forces of the Syrian Army and their Hezbollah allies. The rebels fled to the villages of Flita, Ras Al-Maar and Rankus.
Yesterday, the Army captured Flita and Ras Al-Maar, leaving only Rankus to be captured by government forces before completely cutting rebel supplies from Lebanon into Qalamoun. With the Qalamoun region firmly in Govt. hands The rebel’s loss of the region is seen as a symbolic and practical blow for the opposition.Now the rebels had no way of supplying their forces in rural Damascus, where government forces are surrounding a series of opposition-held areas, denying them food, power and clean water.
The victory in the battle of Qalamoun has effectively ensured that the rebel plans of conquering Damascus and ending the war are not going to see the light of day, at least in the foreseeable future.
