Syrian army and allies push into southern Damascus: activists

[YahooNews]

By Khaled Yacoub Oweis AMMAN (Reuters) - Syrian army and Shi'ite Muslim fighters attacked Sunni rebel areas in southern Damascus on Sunday in an offensive aimed at breaking resistance to President Bashar al-Assad around the capital, activists said. Militia from Iran and Iraq and the Lebanese Shi'ite group Hezbollah, who overran two southern suburbs last month, are looking to build up their advances by capturing opposition districts closer to the center of Damascus, the sources said. Fighters from the al-Qaeda linked al-Nusra Front and the Islamic State for Iraq and the Levant, which is heavily comprised of foreign jihadists, have joined Islamist rebel brigades and Free Syrian Army units in close quarters fighting around the district of Hajar al-Aswad. It is one of a series of Sunni districts on the edge of Damascus at the forefront of the uprising against Assad, who belongs to the Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam that has dominated Syria since the 1960s.