IS unleashes offensive against "revolution capital" in northern Syria

The Islamic State (IS) group unleashed a wide-scale offensive after midnight against the city of Mare' in the northern countryside of Aleppo province in northern Syria, a monitor group reported on Saturday.

Intense battles are still raging at the outskirts of Mare' between an array of jihadi groups and the IS militants, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The UK-based watchdog group said the IS also detonated car bombs in their push toward the city, adding that the terror-designated group managed to infiltrate its outskirts.

The incessant battles at Mare' killed 16 IS militants and 10 rebel fighters. The IS has been trying to storm that town for over two years in vain.

The U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) unleashed a broad offensive on the IS de facto capital of al-Raqqa in northern Syria, prompting the later to strike somewhere else, possibly to release some of the pressures on al-Raqqa, where the SDF has become in control of over 10 towns and farmlands in the northern countryside of that province.

Mare' is known as the "capital of the revolution" among the opposition activists, as it was the launching pad of the armed insurgency in the countryside of Aleppo toward the city itself.

The town has a strategic location near the Turkish borders and the IS control over it could cut off the rebel supply lines in northern Aleppo. Endit