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Mainly Kurdish fighters control much of Syrian IS stronghold

But the road, which passes through southern edges of the city, remains too unsafe for civilians to use, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Sunday.

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A Syrian coalition of jihadists and Islamist rebels on Saturday seized key positions south of Aleppo as they press a major offensive to break the government siege of the city, a monitor said.

Jabhat Fateh al-Sham – formerly the Nusra Front and until recently al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate which is seen as a terrorist organisation by the west – has played a key part in the conter-offensive.

Abdel Rahman said the advance had left the regime forces “in a very hard position despite Russian air support”.

Another 42 people, including 11 children, have been killed in strikes on eastern Aleppo, it said.

The news that DAESH has lost control of Manbij comes as another rebel alliance which receives less overt support from the coalition, The Army of Conquest, claims to have all-but broken the Syrian regime siege of the nearby city of Aleppo.

The facility is located about 1.6 kilometers (1 mile) from the besieged opposition areas. It has a huge supply of ammunitions and is used regularly to shell parts of the city held by opposition forces.

Rebels posted footage of their fighters embracing and celebrating the end of the government encirclement of Aleppo, in place since July 17.

The fall of that strip would also cut off western Aleppo, which is in regime hands.

The alliance of rebels, known as the Army of Conquest, said on Friday they had seized the main fortress-like artillery academy in the Ramosa quarter in southwestern Aleppo.

Government forces control western parts of Aleppo, Syria’s second largest city, and have surrounded the rebel controlled east of the city with the help of Russian airpower. An Ahrar al-Sham fighter in the video claimed that militants are in full control of the college showing destroyed tanks and artillery pieces captured by the gunmen.

Inside the city, Free Syrian Army (FSA), among them vetted USA -backed groups, helped pile pressure on the army and its allies along other frontlines.

Foreign opponents of Assad including Saudi Arabia and Turkey have been supplying vetted rebel groups with weapons via a Turkey-based operations center.

Some of these groups have received military training overseen by the US Central Intelligence Agency.

The Britain-based group said it was unclear if the raids on the Marjeh district were carried out by Syrian or Russian aircraft.

Earlier Saturday, activists said predominantly Kurdish fighters are now in control of most of a stronghold of the Islamic State group in northern Syria after a push under the cover of airstrikes by the USA -led coalition.

The monitor said more than 700 fighters from both sides had been killed in the onslaught, majority rebels because of the regime’s “aerial superiority”.

Some rebel groups are referring to the Aleppo battle as the “Ibrahim al-Youssef Offensive”, a reference to a Sunni army officer said to have led a massacre of cadets at the Artillery College in the late 1970s.

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Earlier, the army had said that they have killed at least a thousand insurgents so far since attacks began earlier this week.

Syria Rebels claim end of siege in Aleppo