The army of Syrian President Bashar Assad has launched a counter-offensive against the Islamist rebel forces, which last week launched a surprise offensive in northwestern Syria, DPA reported.
Early this morning, Syrian military units pushed the rebels about 10 km from the city of Hama, the non-governmental organization Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported, as well as government representatives in Damascus.
During the night there was fierce fighting in which the ground forces were supported by fighters.
In the middle of last week, the rebels, led by the Islamist group "Hayat Tahrir al-Sham" launched an offensive in northwestern Syria and a few days later took control of the second largest city of Aleppo.
According to the London-based monitoring center, which monitors the war with a network of informants on the ground, the fighting has killed more than 570 people, nearly 100 of them civilians.