Heavy fighting in Mahin, Homs centered around SAA Arms Depot
This is a joint effort between u/uptodatepronto and u/Dont_LookAtMyName.
We're looking for more recent videos to confirm everything being reported from activists online now and will continue to do so.
This thread will track the fighting we've seen in Mahin, Homs in recent weeks. As we find more up to date information, we will add it as soon as we see it.
It's said Mahin has one of the largest Arms Depots in the country. Judging from an overhead view on a map, you can clearly see this base is very, very big:
http://wikimapia.org/#lang=en&lat=34.208076&lon=37.034504&z=16&m=b&search=mahin
u/uptodatepronto's counts 94 buildings total across the entire base. Here's a small summary:
At the base entrance, there are two checkpoint buildings and four admin buildings.
At the main office, there are 7 admin buildings and 5 smaller shacks.
In total, there are 36 main storage buildings with 33 more smaller structures interspersed in between.
There are also two perimeter defense positions with tanks and about three buildings each there.
Below are links to activists' reports and articles covering the recent fighting beginning on October 23rd through today, November 1st:
11/1 - Per Jabhat al-Nusra's and ISIS's official twitter accounts:
JAN Twitter: الله اكبر......حمص سيطرة كاملة على مستودعات الذخيرة في مهين وهي من أضخم وأكبر المستودعات في سوريا مع رفع رايات النصر فوق تلالها .
Translation: "God is great. Homs, we have complete control over the ammunition depots in humiliating defeat. One of the largest warehouses in Syria with the lifting of victory draped over the hills"
And an ISIS account: المستودع الضخم بحمص المسيطر عليه شارك في تحريره عدة ألويه إسلامية بينها جبهة النصرة.
Translation: "Huge warehouse in Homs controlled co-edited several brigades Islamic including victory Front."
11/1 - Per Daraa news: Destroy 5 tanks to Assad's gangs and dozens were killed near the town of Mahin, thankfully.
https://twitter.com/DaraaNews/status/396330253406052352
11/1 - Jihadist tweet: Your mujahideen brothers have been able to destroy most of the machines that defend Mahin's warehouses and they have completely surrounded it with the help of God.
https://twitter.com/M4__z/status/396353335668006912
11/1 - Picture of a opposition fighter in Mahin -
https://twitter.com/mohammad56056/status/396360890616147969
11/1 - Picture of dead SAA soldiers -
https://twitter.com/qmzp1434/status/396383191160090624
10/30 - Video uploaded showing opposition fighters fighting in Sadad:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4AomrLn7oo - NSFW
10/27 - Opposition fighters overran a checkpoint near Mahin securing weapons and munitions
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G90otDxuVZE
10/27 - Opposition fighter in Mahin firing a Chinese FN-6 MANPAD at a helicopter. They celebrate as if they hit it but video evidence is inconclusive
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsxKbQ8ur_s
10/26 - Per the SOHR:
The leader of a rebel battalion was killed by the clashes taking place in the towns of Mahin and Sadad between al-Nusra, supported by fighters from the ISIS, al-Khadraa' battalion and Maghawir Baba A'mru battalion. Clashes are ongoing, also taking place in the Hawarin and al-Hadath areas of southeast Homs province.
Information from Sadad indicates that some residents have been able to flee the neighbourhoods controlled by Jabhat al-Nusra. The families of the recent internally displaced have told the SOHR that the clashes and explosions were ongoing in their neighbourhoods. The clashes were said to have begun after 2 non-Syrian suicide bombers detonated themselves by the Gas well on 21/10/2013.
https://www.facebook.com/syriaohr/posts/439679942807016
10/23 - Per The Daily Star - Syria rebels advance towards arms depots: Activists
Syrian mainstream and Islamist rebels pressed an advance Wednesday against troops in Homs province aimed at capturing major weapons depots, rebels and activists said.
Several brigades, among them the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and Al-Nusra Front, seized control of army positions "near weapons depots, by Mahin village," the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Rebels also seized a gas well located outside Sadad, a Christian town near Mahin, said the Observatory, as clashes pitted them against loyalists.
On Monday, opposition fighters entered Sadad, aiming to advance through it towards Mahin and the depots.
But the army pushed them back and deployed its own troops in Sadad, said the Observatory, which also reported five killed in Wednesday's clashes there.
10/23 - Per the SOHR:
Clashes were ongoing this afternoon between the Jabhat al-Nusra, with: ISIS, al-Khadra' battalion (known as the battalion of martyrs), Maghawir Baba Amr battalion, and rebel support, against regime forces in the towns of Mahin and Sadad. there is mass migration out of Sadad, which is a historical town and inhabited by christians. The area is expected to suffer from intense clashes, headed by al-Nusra, as refugees testified after encountering the fighters in Reef al-Mahin. the fighters also told them that the battles are not to control the town but to control the hospital in it, in order to use it for the fighters who are being wounded in the clashes. Reports that 5 civilians were killed by rebel snipers, which were on the roofs of the al-Tal neighbourhood os Sadad.
The Nusra and its allies have taken control of the gas well near the town of Sadad, as well as the security branch and Hajjanah battalion by the arms depot, by the town of Mahin -which is one of the largest in the country. 1 rebel was killed by clashes in the town of Mahin. the airforce bombarded parts of the town earlier today, causing fires in resident houses.
Clashes in the town of al-Sukhnainitial reports of military armoured vehicles being destroyed. 1 rebel, from Reef al-Quseir, was killed by the clashes by Sadad and Mahin.
Posted Nov 1, 2013, 10:03 PM UTC · edited