Who benefits from attacks on Turkish forces in Idlib?
Repeated attacks on Turkish posts and soldiers in Idlib are obstructing Turkish efforts to reopen the M4 international highway and cement the cease-fire, raising questions about the parties behind the attacks.
ALEPPO, Syria — The Turkish Defense Ministry recently announced the killing of a sergeant in an attack waged by unknown men Jan. 31 in Syria’s northwestern province of Idlib. The ministry tweeted Feb. 3 that Sgt. Basri Demirel of the Turkish city of Kayseri died in Hatay Hospital in southern Turkey, near the border with Syria, due to wounds he suffered in a terrorist attack on Turkish soldiers Jan. 31.
It was the latest in a series of such incidents. On Jan. 16, the little-known Ansar Abu Bakr al-Siddiq Brigade targeted a Turkish army post in Batabo town in Aleppo’s western countryside. On Sept. 6, 2020, the jihadi group shot Turkish soldiers in Maataram near Ariha in the south of Idlib, killing one Turkish soldier and wounding another. And on Aug. 27, 2020, the same group claimed responsibility for a car bomb attack near a Turkish post in the Jisr al-Shughur area in Idlib’s western countryside.
The little-known Khattab al-Shishani Brigades targeted joint Turkish-Russian patrols on the Aleppo-Latakia M4 international highway three times. The first was on July 14, 2020, when a booby-trapped car targeted a joint Turkish-Russian patrol on the M4 road. On Aug. 17, 2020, the jihadis claimed responsibility for targeting a vehicle from the patrol with a rocket-propelled grenade and on Aug. 25, 2020, a joint patrol on the M4 highway was also targeted by the group.
The repeated targeting of the Turkish military in Idlib has pushed the Turkish army to install surveillance cameras on the M4 highway Feb. 1 to try to foil any potential targeting of Turkish military posts and locations.
