Russian warplanes launched heavy airstrikes against Islamic State positions in the ancient city of Palmyra on Thursday. The strikes killed dozens of ISIS fighters in a second day of air raids against the area. On Wednesday Russian warplanes carried out 150 raids in that area. These strikes come after ISIS lost its remaining foothold in Syria's Hasakah province to the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), who are backed by American-led coalition air power, and ahead of what some suspect might be a Syrian ground offensive aimed at retaking Palmyra. "If they [the regime forces] take Tadmur [Palmyra] and Qarayatain, the regime would have taken back a big geographic area of Syria," the head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor, Rami Abdulrahman, told Reuters. The Syrian regime was humiliated in May 2015 when Palmyra fell to ISIS and many of its soldiers were captured and executed en masse. Also in August 2014 ISIS afflicted a devastating defeat on the regime when it overran Al-Tabqa air base and in doing so came to the dominate the Raqqa province. Two defeats it will likely take the opportunity to avenge.
