Deir al-Zor

Dust clouds have covered the skies of southeastern provinces, while the visibility range has decreased due to the dust transportation from Syria.

Layers of dust coated vehicles and apartment balconies in the provinces of Şırnak, Bingöl, Mardin and Tunceli late on May 23.

The Syrian government declared victory over Islamic State in the eastern city of Deir al-Zor on Friday, a big blow to the jihadists as their last stronghold in Syria crumbles, Reuters reported. 

Deir al-Zor, on the west bank of the Euphrates River, is the largest and most important city in eastern Syria, and is the center of the country's oil production.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Monday that Islamic State killed at least 128 people in a Syrian town in central Homs over a three-week period before the Syrian army recaptured it on Saturday.

There was no immediate comment from Syrian government officials or state media on the report by the Observatory, a Britain-based war monitor.

 U.S.-backed militias said they captured a major oil field in Deir al-Zor province on Sunday, pressing their offensive against Islamic State fighters in eastern Syria, Reuters reports.
The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said they gained control of al-Omar oil field, one of Syria's largest, on the eastern bank of the Euphrates river.

Russia accused the United States on Tuesday of pretending to fight Islamic State and of deliberately reducing its airstrikes in Iraq to allow the group's militants to stream into Syria to slow the Russian-backed advance of the Syrian army.

Syrian troops seized a suburb of the eastern city of Deir al-Zor on Sept. 17, tightening the noose around Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), a Syrian military source said.

The army pushed into the city this month with the help of Russian air power and Iran-backed militias, breaking an ISIL siege of an enclave there that had lasted three years.

On his way back from Kazakhstan on Sept. 10, Turkish President Tayyip Erdoğan told reporters on board his plane that his meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump would be a good opportunity to cover all the issues between them.

Russia said on Sept. 8 to have killed several top commanders of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group in an airstrike in Syria, including the "minister of war" who has a bounty on his head.

An aid convoy arrived at Deir al-Zor in eastern Syria on Sept. 7, bringing supplies to soldiers and civilians days after the Syrian army broke a three-year Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) siege, Syrian state media reported.

None of the sides can claim victory in the Syrian civil war, U.N. peace talks mediator Staffan de Mistura said on Sept. 6, adding that Syria's opposition must accept that they have not won the six-and-a-half year war against President Bashar al-Assad.