Syrian government forces clashed with the Kurdish-led, US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in northern Aleppo governorate, leaving at least four people dead in artillery fire and gun battles.
Syria’s state-run SANA news agency said one soldier was killed and three others wounded in an attack by SDF fighters on Tuesday.
Separately, state television, citing the interior ministry, reported that three civilians, including two women, were killed and others wounded, among them two children, in shelling of a residential area it blamed on the SDF.
“Heavy fighting between government forces and the SDF fighters is continuing and is particularly concentrated in the districts of Ashrafiyah and Sheikh Maqsoud, where the majority of the Kurds live,” Al Jazeera’s Resul Serdar Atas reported from Beit Jinn, Syria.
“And now we’re seeing the heavy shelling, mortar shelling, rockets being fired. But for the first time drones are also involved from both parties.”
The clashes came two days after senior SDF leaders met Syrian officials in Damascus for talks on integrating the SDF into the regular army.
‘Indiscriminate shelling’
The Syria Now news platform said the fighting began when the SDF launched a drone in Aleppo’s al-Midan neighborhood.
In a statement, the SDF denied responsibility for the shelling that killed civilians, instead saying a shell fired by “factions affiliated with the Damascus government” landed in the area.
“This indiscriminate shelling constitutes a direct attack on residential areas and exposes the lives of civilians to grave danger,” the statement said.
Meanwhile, the Aleppo Media Directorate urged residents to avoid the Ashrafiyah and Sheikh Maqsoud neighborhoods as clashes continued.
The question of how to integrate the SDF, which controls large parts of northern and northeastern Syria, into state institutions has remained contentious since President Ahmed al-Sharaa took office a year ago.
A March 2025 agreement under which the SDF agreed that “all civil and military institutions in northeastern Syria” would be merged into “the Syrian state, including border crossings, the airport, and oil and gas fields” has yet to be implemented.
Earlier this week, talks between government officials and the main SDF commander stalled, with “no tangible results” achieved, state media reported.
New Israeli regime incursion
As fighting continued in the north, at least 12 Israeli regime military vehicles entered a village in southern Syria.
The latest incursion on Tuesday into Saida al-Golan village in the Quneitra countryside came as a Syrian delegation was holding negotiations with Israeli counterparts in the French capital.
The talks were expected to continue into a second and final day on Tuesday, even as “Israel is again violating Syrian sovereignty and undermining talks,” Al Jazeera’s Ayman Oghanna reported from Beit Jinn near Damascus.
There are “vast chasms” between Syria’s and Israel’s desired outcomes, Oghanna said.
He added that Israel is seeking full demilitarization of southern Syria, the continued presence of its military outposts in Jabal al-Sheikh, and protection for the Druze minority, which it previously cited as a pretext to bombard Damascus when fighting erupted in Suwayda.
“The Syrian requests are far simpler – they simply want the Israelis to leave … and to end all strikes, incursions, and hostilities into sovereign Syrian territory,” Oghanna said.
‘Absolutely counterproductive’
Marie Forestier, a nonresident senior fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Syria Project, said the gap between Syrian, Israeli and US objectives is “very difficult,” particularly given that “Israel is doing everything to destabilize Syria.”
“This is an absolutely counterproductive strategy,” Forestier said.
“Israel might create more chaos in Syria, which could then bring to power people who could target Israel.”
In a related development, a government source told SANA on Monday that the resumption of negotiations underscored Syria’s firm commitment to restoring its non-negotiable national rights.
Since the fall of Bashar al-Assad, Israel has expanded its occupation of Syrian territory beyond the Golan Heights and carried out repeated raids and bombardments across southern Syria.
For months, Israeli regime forces have conducted near-daily incursions, particularly in Quneitra governorate, setting up checkpoints, making arrests and bulldozing land, fueling growing public anger and unrest.
Despite a decline in direct military threats, the Israeli army continues to carry out air strikes that have killed civilians and destroyed Syrian army sites and facilities.
Over the past year, Israel has launched more than 600 air, drone and artillery attacks across Syria, nearly two a day on average, according to data compiled by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project.