A coalition of Islamist rebels seized an army base in northwestern Syria at dawn on Monday after a suicide bomber from al Qaeda’s Nusra Front drove a truck packed with explosives into the compound and blew it up.
The capture, reported by a rebel commander and social media videos showing militants inside the base, brought the coalition closer to seizing most of Idlib province and moving toward Latakia, the ancestral home of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
A truck with two tonnes of explosives penetrated one of the entrances of the camp that made it easier to take over the camp
Sheikh Husam Abu Bakr, a rebel commander from Ahrar al-Sham movement said via Skype.
The Syrian army had been using the Qarmeed camp to shell rebel-held towns and villages in the strategic agricultural region bordering Turkey. Controlling it should help the rebels tighten their siege on the major Mastouma army base nearby.
Syrian state media said the army killed scores of Nusra fighters and dozens of Islamist suicide bombers from Russia’s Chechnya region in fighting near the base, but did not say the compound had fallen to the militants.
