BEIRUT (Reuters) - Islamic State militants killed more than 200 people in a coordinated assault on a government-held area of southwestern Syria on Wednesday, local officials and a war monitor said, in the group’s deadliest attack in the country for years.

Jihadist fighters stormed several villages and staged suicide blasts in the provincial capital Sweida, near one of the few remote pockets still held by Islamic State after it was driven from most of its territory last year.

The head of the Sweida provincial health authority told the pro-Damascus Sham FM that 215 people were killed and 180 injured in the attack, as well as 75 Islamic State fighters.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said the attackers had killed more than 200 people including many civilians. Islamic State said in an earlier statement that it had killed more than 100 people in the attacks.

The jihadists launched simultaneous attacks on several villages northeast of Sweida city, where they clashed with government forces, state media and the Observatory said.

In the city itself, at least two attackers blew themselves up, one near a marketplace and the second in another district, state television said. State news agency SANA said two other militants were killed before they could detonate their bombs.

The Observatory said jihadists seized hostages from the villages they had attacked.

Photographs distributed on social media, which Reuters could not independently verify but which the Observatory said were genuine, purported to show the bodies of Islamic State fighters hanged from street signs by angry residents.

Sweida Governor Amer al-Eshi said authorities also arrested another attacker. “The city of Sweida is secure and calm now,” he told state-run Ikhbariyah TV.

Islamic State lost nearly all the territory it once held in Syria last year in separate offensives by the Russian-backed army and a U.S.-backed militia alliance.

Since then, President Bashar al-Assad has gone on to crush the last remaining rebel enclaves near the cities of Damascus and Homs and swept rebels from the southwest.

After losing its strongholds in eastern Syria last year, Islamic State launched insurgency operations from pockets of territory in desert areas.

The Observatory said government forces had forced the jihadists from all the villages they had stormed from their pocket northeast of the city.

Government troops and allied forces hold all of Sweida province except for that enclave.

Remains of a suicide bomb are seen in Sweida, Syria July 25, 2018. Sana/Handout via REUTERS

The air force pounded militant hideouts northeast of the city after soldiers thwarted an attempt by Islamic State fighters to infiltrate Douma, Tima and al-Matouna villages, state media said.

With the help of Russian air power, the Syrian army has been hitting Islamic State in a separate pocket further west, near the frontier with the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

The Yarmouk Basin in southwest Syria remains in jihadist hands, after an army offensive defeated rebel factions in other parts of the southwest. The operation has focused on Deraa and Quneitra provinces.</s>Syria suicide blasts: Islamic State kills more than 200 in coordinated attacks in south-west

Islamic State militants have killed more than 200 people in a coordinated assault on a government-held area of south-western Syria, local officials and a war monitor said, in the group's deadliest attack in the country for years.

The coordinated attacks across the province of Sweida, which included several suicide bombings, shattered the calm of a region that has been largely insulated from the worst of the violence of Syria's seven-year-long civil war.

The suicide bomb blasts inside the provincial capital, also called Sweida, were apparently timed to coincide with attacks on villages in the eastern countryside, creating mayhem across the province.

The attacks triggered deadly clashes between pro-government fighters and residents who picked up weapons to defend their hometowns on one side and IS militants on the other.

By nightfall, the province's health directorate had recorded 215 civilians killed and 180 wounded, according to local official Hassan Omar, making it the single bloodiest day for the province since the 2011 national revolt that sparked the ongoing civil war.

Sultan Bou Ammar, a resident of the village of Shbiki, said some residents unwittingly opened their doors when militants knocked early Thursday morning, so unexpected was the attack.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said at least 200 people were killed, including 94 residents who were part of local defence militias that have the backing of the Syrian Government.

The head of the Sweida provincial health authority told the pro-Damascus Sham FM 75 Islamic State fighters had also been killed.

Syrian state media aired graphic scenes of two blast sites within Sweida city, one showing the bodies of victims and another the aftermath of a motorcycle bombing that struck a busy vegetable market.

The coordinated attacks — the deadliest in months — had all the hallmarks of IS even before it claimed responsibility and were reminiscent of the group's horrific assaults during past years in Syria, already ravaged by civil war.

A statement posted on IS social media channels said militants carried out surprise attacks on government and security centres in Sweida, sparking clashes with Syrian troops and allied militias before detonating their explosive belts.

State news agency SANA said two other IS militants were killed before they could detonate their bombs.

Sweida Governor Amer al-Eshi said authorities also arrested another attacker.

Islamic State still operating in some areas

While Islamic State still has pockets of territory in eastern Syria and in the country's south, it was driven from all other areas it once held in Syria and Iraq last year in separate offensives by the Russian-backed army and a US-backed militia alliance.

Since then, President Bashar al-Assad has gone on to crush the last remaining rebel enclaves near the cities of Damascus and Homs and swept rebels from the south-west.

After losing its strongholds in eastern Syria last year, IS launched insurgency operations from pockets of territory in desert areas.

Government troops and allied forces hold all of Sweida province except for that enclave. It is populated mainly by Syria's minority Druze.

The air force pounded militant hideouts north-east of the city after soldiers thwarted an attempt by IS fighters to infiltrate Douma, Tima and al-Matouna villages, state media said.

The army and villagers regained control of a hill and broke a brief siege of another nearby village after clashes, Ikhbariyah said.

With the help of Russian air power, the Syrian army has been hitting IS in a separate pocket further west, near the frontier with the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

The Yarmouk Basin in south-west Syria remains in jihadist hands.

Since their offensive in June, Syrian President Bashar Assad's forces have retaken control of Daraa city and province.

The city of Sweida has largely been spared most of the violence that Syrian cities have witnessed in the years since the conflict started in 2011.

For the southern offensive, government forces redeployed troops from Sweida province last month.</s>BEIRUT (Reuters) - Attacks in the Syrian province of Sweida killed 215 people on Wednesday, the director of health in the southwestern province told the pro-government Sham FM.

Islamic State said it had carried out the seemingly coordinated attacks, which included suicide bombings, in several villages and the provincial capital, also called Sweida.</s>July 25 (UPI) -- More than 200 people were killed in a series of attacks in Syria on Wednesday, government officials said.

The attacks targeted the city of Sweida and surrounding areas in south-west Syria, where director of health for the surrounding Sweida province said at least 215 people had been killed in the attack, The Guardian reported.

About a dozen people are also believed to have been kidnapped.

Ahed Mrad, a journalist from Sweida, said the attacks took place almost simultaneously between 3:50 a.m. and 4:30 a.m.

"They attacked homes in a coordinated attack. They knocked on doors, and then entered the homes and killed people in there," Mrad said. "A lot of victims fell before any bullet was fired because they were going into the homes and slaughtering people silently, at dawn, without anyone being aware."

The Islamic State took credit for carrying out the attacks, the BBC reported. The group also launched two suicide attacks on the provincial capital.

The state-run Syrian Arab News Agency reported that government authorities killed two suicide bombers before they detonated their vests.

The attacks came after the Syrian government launched a campaign to retake areas in the southern parts of the country that remain under rebel control, with Russia's assistance.</s>BEIRUT—A series of Islamic State attacks in southwest Syria killed and injured scores on Wednesday, a show of deadly force in an area where the government is pressing an offensive against an affiliate of the extremist group.

A suicide bomber on a motorcycle struck a vegetable market in the provincial capital of Sweida as vendors arrived in the early morning, state media said. It said three other suicide bombing attempts were foiled, but an outside monitoring group said they hit their targets, including at two busy traffic junctions.

The attacks coincided with Islamic State assaults on government-held positions in nearby villages. The fighting between government troops and the militants continued into the afternoon, according to state media

As its territorial control shrinks, Islamic State has increasingly resorted to suicide attacks to show that it is still able to strike anywhere—especially in regime-controlled areas.

The violence marks the group’s deadliest assault on the area in recent months, but the exact toll wasn’t clear. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that 156 died as a result of the coordinated attacks, including 62 civilians and 94 pro-government fighters. It added that 38 Islamic State fighters also died in the clashes.

State media, quoting local officials, said more than 50 people were killed and scores more injured, but the government often plays down attacks in areas it controls.

Islamic State, which claimed responsibility for the attacks, said they killed more than 100 and wounded dozens.

The Syrian government didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment, and it wasn’t clear why there was a discrepancy in the reported suicide attacks.

Separate offensives by the Russia-backed regime of President Bashar al-Assad and U.S.-backed militia have routed the Islamic State in most parts of Syria.

After retaking a large part of southern Syria from the opposition in recent weeks, the regime has now stepped up its military campaign to seize a last pocket near Sweida, home mostly to the country’s minority Druse religious sect, that is held by an Islamic State affiliate, the Khaled bin Waleed army.

The Khaled bin Waleed army holds territory in an area known as the Yarmouk Basin, which borders on the Golan Heights in Syria.

On Tuesday, Israel’s military said it shot down a Syrian jet fighter that entered its airspace over the occupied Golan Heights.

A Syrian military official said the warplane was in Syrian airspace, Syrian state media reported, and was carrying out strikes on the Islamic State-affiliated group.</s>BEIRUT (Reuters) - Attacks in the Syrian province of Sweida killed 215 people on Wednesday, the director of health in the southwestern province told the pro-government Sham FM.

Islamic State said it had carried out the seemingly coordinated attacks, which included suicide bombings, in several villages and the provincial capital, also called Sweida.

This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed.</s>BEIRUT, (Reuters) – Islamic State militants killed more than 200 people in a coordinated assault on a government-held area of southwestern Syria yesterday, local officials and a war monitor said, in the group’s deadliest attack in the country for years.

Jihadist fighters stormed several villages and staged suicide blasts in the provincial capital Sweida, near one of the few remote pockets still held by Islamic State after it was driven from most of its territory last year.

The head of the Sweida provincial health authority told the pro-Damascus Sham FM that 215 people were killed and 180 injured in the attack, as well as 75 Islamic State fighters.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said the attackers had killed more than 200 people including many civilians. Islamic State said in an earlier statement that it had killed more than 100 people in the attacks.

The jihadists launched simultaneous attacks on several villages northeast of Sweida city, where they clashed with government forces, state media and the Observatory said.

In the city itself, at least two attackers blew themselves up, one near a marketplace and the second in another district, state television said. State news agency SANA said two other militants were killed before they could detonate their bombs.

The Observatory said jihadists seized hostages from the villages they had attacked.

Photographs distributed on social media, which Reuters could not independently verify but which the Observatory said were genuine, purported to show the bodies of Islamic State fighters hanged from street signs by angry residents.</s>BEIRUT—A series of Islamic State attacks in southwest Syria killed and injured scores on Wednesday, a show of deadly force in an area where the government is pressing an offensive against an affiliate of the extremist group.

A suicide bomber on a motorcycle struck a vegetable market in the provincial capital of Sweida as vendors arrived in the early morning, state media said. It said three other suicide bombing attempts were foiled, but an outside monitoring group said they hit their targets, including at two busy traffic...</s>BEIRUT — The death toll from coordinated attacks by Islamic State fighters on a usually peaceful southern Syrian city and surrounding countryside has climbed to 216, a local health official said Thursday, in the worst violence to hit the area since the country’s conflict began.

Mass funerals were held in the city of Sweida on Thursday, a day after the wave of attacks that began in the early hours of the mourning and lasted for hours. The city was the scene of several suicide bombings, including one at a busy vegetable market that left a scene of devastation and set in motion the coordinated assaults.

ISIS militants also attacked a number of villages in the northeast of the province, also called Sweida, where local militias and residents took up arms to fight the advancing militants.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights put the death toll at 246, including 111 members of local militias who fought ISIS militants who swarmed their villages. At least 135 civilians were among the killed, the Observatory said.

Hassan Omar, a government health official in Sweida province, said on Thursday that at least 150 people were wounded in the attacks; some of them were in critical condition.

An activist-operated Facebook page called Sweida News Network said many of the killed were shot in the head. The SNN said the militants sneaked into the villages under the cover of darkness, shooting residents as they slept.

The Observatory also reported bodies found killed inside homes and that the militants had also abducted some residents, their fate unknown.

The rare attacks in Sweida, populated mainly by Syria’s minority Druze, came amid a government offensive elsewhere in the country’s south. Government forces are battling an ISIS-linked group near the frontier with Israeli-occupied Golan Heights and near the border with Jordan. The group also has a small presence on the eastern edge of Sweida province, and in the desert in the adjacent Homs province.

Since their offensive in June, Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces have retaken territories controlled by the rebels along the Golan Heights frontier and are now fighting militants in the country’s southern tip.

ISIS has been largely defeated in Syria and Iraq, but still has pockets of territory it controls in eastern and southern Syria.

The extremist group boasted that its “soldiers” killed more than 100 people in Sweida.

In a statement posted on the group’s social media channels, it said its militants carried out surprise attacks on government and security centers, sparking clashes with Syrian troops and allied militias.

The Islamic State group posted no death toll for its own men in Wednesday’s fighting.</s>The following content is sourced from external partners. We cannot guarantee that it is suitable for the visually or hearing impaired.

This content was published on July 25, 2018 7:33 PM

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Attacks in the Syrian province of Sweida killed 215 people on Wednesday, the director of health in the southwestern province told the pro-government Sham FM. Islamic State said it had carried out the seemingly coordinated attacks, which included suicide bombings, in several villages and the provincial capital, also called Sweida. Form for signing up for free newsletter. Sign up for our free newsletters and get the top stories delivered to your inbox.
Coordinated suicide bombings and shootings carried out by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant in As-Suwayda, Syria, kill 215 people and injure more than 200 others.