BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian rebels took full control of the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp on Monday after fighting raged for days in the district on the southern edge of President Bashar al-Assad’s Damascus powerbase, rebel and Palestinian sources said. 
 
 The battle had pitted rebels, backed by some Palestinians, against Palestinian fighters of the pro-Assad Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC). Many PFLP-GC fighters defected to the rebel side and their leader Ahmed Jibril left the camp two days ago, rebel sources said. 
 
 “All of the camp is under the control of the (rebel) Free Syrian Army,” said a Palestinian activist in Yarmouk. He said clashes had stopped and the remaining PFLP fighters retreated to join Assad’s forces massed on the northern edge of the camp. 
 
 The battle in Yarmouk is one of a series of conflicts on the southern fringes of Assad’s capital, as rebels try to choke the power of the 47-year-old leader after a 21-month-old uprising in which 40,000 people have been killed. 
 
 Government forces have used jets and artillery to try to dislodge the fighters but the violence has crept into the heart of the city and activists say rebels overran three army stations in a new offensive in the central province of Hama on Monday. 
 
 On the border with Lebanon, hundreds of Palestinian families fled across the frontier following the weekend violence in Yarmouk, a Reuters witness said. 
 
 Syria hosts half a million Palestinian refugees, most living in Yarmouk, descendants of those admitted after the creation of Israel in 1948, and has always cast itself as a champion of the Palestinian struggle, sponsoring several guerrilla factions. 
 
 Both Assad’s government and the mainly Sunni Muslim Syrian rebels have enlisted and armed divided Palestinian factions as the uprising has developed into a civil war. 
 
 “NEITHER SIDE CAN WIN” 
 
 Syrian Vice President Farouq al-Sharaa said in a newspaper interview published on Monday that neither Assad’s forces nor rebels seeking to overthrow him can win the war. 
 
 Sharaa, a Sunni Muslim in a power structure dominated by Assad’s Alawite minority, has rarely been seen since the revolt erupted in March 2011 and is not part of the president’s inner circle directing the fight against Sunni rebels. But he is the most prominent figure to say in public that Assad will not win. 
 
 Sharaa said the situation in Syria was deteriorating and a “historic settlement” was needed to end the conflict, involving regional powers and the U.N. Security Council and the formation of a national unity government “with broad powers”. 
 
 A torn poster of Syria's President Bashar al-Assad is seen at the entrance of a factory in Ouwayjah village in Aleppo December 17, 2012. REUTERS/Zain Karam 
 
 “With every passing day the political and military solutions are becoming more distant. We should be in a position defending the existence of Syria. We are not in a battle for an individual or a regime,” Sharaa was quoted as telling Al-Akhbar newspaper. 
 
 “The opposition cannot decisively settle the battle and what the security forces and army units are doing will not achieve a decisive settlement,” he said, adding that insurgents fighting to topple Syria’s leadership could plunge it into “anarchy and an unending spiral of violence”. 
 
 Sources close to the Syrian government say Sharaa had pushed for dialogue with the opposition and objected to the military response to an uprising that began peacefully. 
 
 In a veiled criticism of the crackdown, he said there was a difference between the state’s duty to provide security to its citizens, and “pursuing a security solution to the crisis”. 
 
 He said even Assad could not be certain where events in Syria were leading, but that anyone who met him would hear that “this is a long struggle...and he does not hide his desire to settle matters militarily to reach a final solution.” 
 
 In Hama province, rebels and the army clashed in a new campaign launched on Sunday by rebels to block off the country’s north, activists said. 
 
 The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition-linked violence monitor, said fighting raged through the provincial towns of Karnaz, Kafar Weeta, Halfayeh and Mahardeh. 
 
 Slideshow (23 Images) 
 
 It said there were no clashes reported in Hama city, which lies on the main north-south highway connecting the capital with Aleppo, Syria’s second city. 
 
 Qassem Saadeddine, a member of the newly established rebel military command, said on Sunday fighters had been ordered to surround and attack army positions across the province. He said Assad’s forces were given 48 hours to surrender or be killed. 
 
 In 1982 Hafez al-Assad, father of the current ruler, crushed an uprising in Hama city, killing up to 30,000 civilians. 
 
 Qatiba al-Naasan, a rebel from Hama, said the offensive would bring retaliatory air strikes from the government but that the situation is “already getting miserable”. ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption "Here comes the barrel bomb" - trapped resident Joud al-Khatib in Aleppo 
 
 Military action has ended in eastern Aleppo, Russia's ambassador to the UN, Vitaly Churkin, has said. 
 
 He said Syrian government troops had re-established control over the last areas of the city held by rebels. 
 
 He said an arrangement had been made for rebel fighters to leave. The rebels confirmed the deal, but said civilians would also be allowed to leave. 
 
 The latest developments could bring to an end more than four years of vicious fighting in which thousands have died. 
 
 Reporters on the ground said there had been no bombardments or fighting in recent hours. 
 
 The rebels had been squeezed into ever smaller areas of the city in recent months in a major government offensive backed by Russian air power. 
 
 Word of the deal came as the UN reported summary killings by pro-government forces. 
 
 It said it had reliable evidence that in four areas 82 civilians were killed, adding that many more may have died. 
 
 The UN and the US said the Syrian government and its allies Russia and Iran were accountable for any atrocities committed in the city. 
 
 Russia said the allegations were untrue. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption As rebels are pushed out of eastern Aleppo, one resident explains why many civilians are unable to escape. 
 
 "According to the latest information that we received in the last hour, military actions in eastern Aleppo are over," Mr Churkin told an emergency session of the UN Security Council. 
 
 Earlier he had spoken of the deal allowing the rebels to leave, saying it would take place within hours. 
 
 "The civilians, they can stay, they can go to safe places, they can take advantage of the humanitarian arrangements that are on the ground. Nobody is going to harm the civilians," Mr Churkin said. 
 
 Rebel groups suggested that civilians would be included in the exodus. 
 
 Extraordinary turnaround: By BBC defence and diplomatic correspondent Jonathan Marcus 
 
 Image copyright AFP Image caption On Monday, Syrians in western Aleppo celebrated the prospect of an imminent victory in the east 
 
 The seizure of the eastern part of the city by government forces and the crushing of the rebel enclave there represents a major propaganda victory for the government of President Bashar al-Assad, which now controls virtually all of the major population centres of the country. 
 
 But Aleppo - the most populous city before the civil war and the country's financial centre - is the biggest prize. 
 
 Its capture represents a victory not just for Mr Assad but also for his Iranian and Russian backers. 
 
 Aleppo itself may not matter much on Moscow's strategic chess-board. But the defeat of the rebel opposition there underscores the extraordinary turn-around in President Assad's fortunes. 
 
 Before Russia intervened President Assad was on the ropes, his military power crumbling. 
 
 External actors have propped up his government in large part to secure their own strategic aspirations. And these aspirations will play an important part in deciding what comes next. 
 
 Aleppo: Key dates in the battle 
 
 Red Cross doctor's heartbreaking letter 
 
 What is the situation in the rebel areas? 
 
 Before the end to hostilities was announced, the rebels had retreated into just a handful of neighbourhoods. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Aleppo MP Fares Shehabi denied government forces were committing atrocities 
 
 It is hard to know exactly how many people are in the besieged areas, although UN envoy Staffan de Mistura put the figure at about 50,000. 
 
 He said there were approximately 1,500 rebel fighters, about 30% of whom were from the jihadist group formerly known as the al-Nusra Front. 
 
 Other local sources say there could be as many as 100,000 people, many of them arriving from areas recently taken by the government. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption "There will be a genocide" Aleppo resident tells BBC Newsnight 
 
 Ibrahim Abu-Laith, a spokesman for the White Helmets volunteer rescue group, said 90% of their equipment was out of operation and only one medical point was still working in the besieged areas. There was no first aid equipment left, he added. 
 
 He said volunteers were using their hands to pull people out of rubble, but some 70 people were stuck and could not be extracted. 
 
 Last messages from Aleppo 
 
 Activist Lina Shamy: "Humans all over the world, don't sleep! You can do something, protest now! Stop the genocide". 
 
 Bana Alabed, aged 7: "I am talking to the world now live from East #Aleppo. This is my last moment to either live or die." 
 
 White Helmets tweet: "All streets & destroyed buildings are full with dead bodies. It's hell." 
 
 Abdul Kafi Alhamado, teacher: "Some people are under the rubble, no-one can help them. They just leave them under the rubble until they die - these houses as their graves." 
 
 The 'final goodbyes' from Aleppo 
 
 What has happened in districts seized by the government? 
 
 UN human rights spokesman Rupert Colville said that 82 civilians had reportedly been killed by pro-government forces, of whom 11 were women and 13 children, adding that the death toll could be much higher. 
 
 He said there were reports of numerous bodies in the streets, with residents unable to retrieve them for fear of being shot on sight. 
 
 The UN's humanitarian adviser on Syria, Jan Egeland, earlier spoke of "massacres of unarmed civilians, of young men, of women, children, health workers", saying a pro-government Iraqi Shia militia was responsible for the killings. 
 
 What does this mean for the civil war? 
 
 This is a huge blow to the armed opposition, and a major victory for the Russians, the Iranians, Lebanon's Hezbollah and some Iraqi Shia militias. 
 
 But the rebels still control quite large areas, as do the jihadists of so-called Islamic State. So in terms of Syria itself the war continues. 
 
 The BBC's Middle East editor Jeremy Bowen says it will be a different type of war - less rebels trying to hold territory and create their own entity, more hit-and-run and insurgency. 
 
 What is the international community saying? 
 
 At the UN Security Council meeting, US ambassador Samantha Power said the Syrian government and Russia and Iran bore responsibility for killings of civilians. 
 
 For the UK, Matthew Rycroft said the UN had failed in its mission to resolve the crisis, and the reports of atrocities "evoked the darkest days of the history of the United Nations". 
 
 Mr Churkin denied humanitarian abuses were taking place. Earlier Russia said atrocities were being carried out by "terrorist groups", referring to rebels. 
 
 How did Aleppo reach this point? 
 
 For much of the past four years, Aleppo has been divided roughly in two, with the government controlling the western half and rebels the east. 
 
 Syrian troops finally broke the deadlock with the help of Iranian-backed militias and Russian air strikes, reinstating a siege on the east in early September and launching an all-out assault weeks later.
– With fighting rattling Damascus, a leading voice in Syria says Bashar al-Assad can't win the war. But neither side will see a victory, says Farouk al-Sharaa, who has kept a low profile in the conflict and isn't involved in running the government's efforts. Sharaa's comments came in an interview with a pro-Assad newspaper, al-Akhbar. He says the only solution is a "historic settlement" forming a national unity government, with help from neighboring countries and the UN. "Change is inevitable." "We should be in a position defending the existence of Syria. We are not in a battle for an individual or a regime," Sharaa said. Government insiders say he has long opposed the government's military action. Meanwhile, central Damascus—which had been relatively quiet in the conflict—is hearing shelling as the military and fighters set up checkpoints. Residents say a Palestinian district has been told to evacuate, pointing to a coming government offensive, Reuters reports. It was reportedly shelled by regime jets yesterday. For their part, rebels say they're planning to take the central Hama province. "Then we will have the area between Aleppo and Hama liberated and open for us," says a spokesman.