Al-Qaeda in Syria executes 56 regime troops

Al-Qaeda’s Syria affiliate and its Islamist allies
have executed at least 56 regime troops at a
military airport they recently seized in the
northwest, a monitoring group said Saturday.
Al-Nusra Front and the Islamists shot dead the
regime fighters, who were being held as prisoners,
“execution-style” inside the Abu Duhur airport, said
Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Syrian
Observatory for Human Rights.
He said the killings in Idlib province had occurred
earlier this week but his monitoring group — which
gathers news from sources on the ground —
confirmed them on Saturday.
Al-Nusra is a leading member of an alliance of
jihadist and Islamist forces called the “Army of
Conquest” that overran the Abu Duhur military
airport on September 9.
When it overran the airbase, the Army of Conquest
killed dozens of regime loyalists and took others
captive.
The powerful coalition has seized almost all of Idlib
province except for Fuaa and Kafraya, two regime-
controlled villages inhabited by Shiite Muslims.
The Army of Conquest ramped up its assault on the
two villages on Friday, detonating at least nine car
bombs, seven of which were suicide bombers, the
Observatory said.
The attack left at least 21 regime loyalists and 17
Army of Conquest militants dead.
One of the suicide bombers managed to enter Fuaa
itself and killed seven civilians, including two
children, Abdel Rahman said.
Fierce clashes and heavy shelling on the two
villages continued on Saturday.
Fuaa, Kafraya and the rebel stronghold of Zabadani
in Damascus province were at the centre of two
failed attempts last month to secure broad
ceasefire deals.