The agreement between Bashar al-Assad’s regime and Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), an al-Qaida-linked group, ended a three-year ordeal for people in the towns of Fua and Kefraya but furthered the trend of demographic change and the reshaping of Syria along sectarian and ethnic lines after seven years of civil war. Residents in northwestern Syria evacuated two Shiite villages on Thursday morning after the Syrian government struck a deal to allow them to leave by pledging to release hundreds of rebel prisoners in exchange. Rebels from Hay'et Tahrir al-Sham - a group formerly linked to al-Qaeda - and Iran-backed forces agreed to the deal to evacuate people in return for the release of more than 1,500 civilians and rebels in state prisons, sources said on Tuesday. A source from HTS also confirmed the deal, telling AFP that more than 100 buses would evacuate 6,900 people including fighters and civilians from Fuaa and Kafraya. Iran, which backs the government of President Bashar al-Assad against the mainly Sunni rebels and has expanded its military role in Syria, has long taken an interest in the fate of the Shia residents of the two towns.
The evacuations of Shia towns Al-Fu'ah and Kafriya in the northern Idlib Governorate begin, as part of a deal between rebel forces and the Syrian government.