Idlib Governorate clashes

Two Turkish soldiers and the driver of a prisoner transport vehicle carrying them were killed in an accident in northern Turkey on April 1, a security source said.

Two major Islamist rebel groups operating in northern Syria are uniting, the France press reported.

"We, Ahhar al-Sham, and Nuredin al Zinki, declare our fusion the name of the Syrian Liberation Front," says a message of the two groups operating in the provinces of Aleppo and Idlib.

Air strikes killed at least five people in a village in the Syrian rebel-held region of Idlib on Tuesday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported,cited by Reuters.

It said the death toll from the air strikes in the village of Tarmala, some 40 km (25 miles) south of Idlib city, was expected to rise. 

Russian combat aviation has stepped up on Monday to hit its strikes against rebel-controlled cities in Syria's Idlib province after a fighter was shot down on Saturday and the pilot was killed, Reuters reported.

A civilian support worker for the Turkish Armed Forces was killed in a terrorist car bomb attack on a military convoy in Syria’s northwestern Idlib province, the Turkish General Staff said late on Jan. 30.

Regime air strikes have killed 33 civilians in the past 24 hours in Syria’s northwestern province of Idlib where government forces are fighting rebels, a monitor said on Jan. 29.

Russia said that fighters have used unmanned airplanes against its military base Hymeim and its naval base Tartus in Syria. The defense ministry announced that attacks on Saturday night were successfully stopped by Russian troops and did not cause casualties or destruction. They used 13 armed unmanned aircrafts, TASS reported.

Turkish forces that entered Syria's Idlib province late on Thursday have started setting up observation positions that appear aimed at containing a Kurdish militia, a senior rebel involved in the operation said early on Friday, Reuters reported.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has announced the start of Turkish military operation into Syria's Idlib province.

"There is a serious operation in Idlib at the moment, and this will continue," Erdogan announced in a speech Saturday to his party members.

Syrian lands across from Turkey's Cilvegözü border gate is being controlled by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which has roots in al-Qaeda.

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