Jihadists from the Islamic State have seized two gas fields and attacked a major air force base close to the central city of Homs in Syria – threatening the dominance of the regime of President Bashar al-Assad in the critical region.
While US-led air strikes have focused on routing a few hundred fighters of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) from the tiny border town of Kobane in northern Syria, the extremist group has pushed south, expanding its grip on terrain that is strategically vital in the battle for control of the country.
On Monday, Isil posted photographs on social media purporting to show the group's distinctive black flag flying high over Jahar gas field, alongside images of the seized vehicles, weaponry and corpses of Syrian regime soldiers that had controlled the field.
The development follows the group's capture of Sha'ar gas plant last week.
In victorious tones the jihadists declared the conquests part of the "Islamic State", the name the group ascribes to land it controls, which now includes more than a third of Syria and swathes of Iraq. » | Ruth Sherlock, Gaziantep and Magdy Samaan | Monday, November 03, 2014
