Idlib — more than Raqqa — may be decisive Syria fault line
Russian-Turkish agreement under strain in key northern city.
“Turkey’s last-ditch efforts to harness Russian military and diplomatic heft to counter the Syrian Kurds and unravel their alliance with the United States are showing few signs of succeeding, like much else in the country’s ill-fated Syrian policy,” writes Amberin Zaman.
A Russian agreement with the Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in the Cindires district of Afrin may foreshadow a potential showdown in Idlib, where al-Qaeda-linked Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and Turkish-backed Salafi groups have taken hold after their defeat in Aleppo.
