ISIS claims first attack on Syrian government since fall of Assad regime

While territorially defeated, the extremist group still has a network of cells

Scenes from the security operation launched by the Aleppo Security Directorate, which targeted a hideout of a terrorist cell affiliated with ISIS. Photo: Syrian Ministry of Interior

ISIS has claimed responsibility for two attacks in southern Syria, including one on government forces that an opposition war monitor described as the first on the Syrian army to be adopted by the extremists since the fall of Bashar Al Assad.

In two separate statements issued late on Thursday, ISIS said that in the first attack, a bomb was detonated targeting a vehicle belonging to the regime, leaving seven soldiers dead or wounded. It said the attack occurred “last Thursday,” or May 22, in the Al Safa area in the desert of the southern province of Sweida.

The second attack, ISIS said, occurred this week in a nearby area during which a bomb targeted members of the US-backed Free Syrian Army, claiming that it killed one fighter and wounded three.

There was no comment from the government on the claim of the attack and a spokesperson for the Free Syrian Army didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that the attack on government forces killed one civilian and wounded three soldiers, describing it as the first such attack to be claimed by ISIS against Syrian forces since the fall of the Assad regime.

Earlier this month, Syrian security troops have started operations to “eradicate” ISIS from urban centres, an Interior Ministry official told The National.

Over the past several months, ISIS has claimed responsibility for attacks against the US-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in the north-east.

ISIS once controlled huge swathes of Syria and Iraq. But it was defeated in Syria in March 2019 when SDF fighters captured the last piece of land that the group held. Since then, its sleeper cells have carried out deadly attacks, mainly in eastern and north-east Syria.

The Assad regime fell last December in the face of a lightening offensive, who now lead the new government in Damascus.