Syria Declares Aleppo Ceasefire After Days of Clashes With Kurdish Fighters
Syria’s Defense Ministry has announced a ceasefire in several flashpoint Aleppo neighborhoods after days of fighting with Kurdish forces, but it is still unclear how fully the Kurdish-led SDF has signed onto the arrangement.
Aleppo has been rocked by several days of urban combat pitting Syrian government forces against Kurdish fighters entrenched in the city’s north, a surge of violence that sent large numbers of residents fleeing and raised fears of a broader breakdown in talks between Damascus and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
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Early Friday, Syria’s Defense Ministry said hostilities would halt starting around 3 a.m. in Sheikh Maqsood, Achrafieh, and Bani Zaid, pairing the truce with a limited, time-bound exit plan for armed elements from those areas. Under the ministry’s plan, withdrawing fighters would be escorted toward the country’s northeast—where the SDF holds significant territory—and would be allowed to retain only light personal arms.
The latest confrontation followed exchanges of shelling and drone attacks, and both sides traded accusations of initiating the escalation and of striking civilian areas and vital services, including medical responders and hospitals.
Displacement has been severe with reports citing about 142,000 people forced from their homes as families scrambled to evacuate amid shifting front lines and government warnings. Civilian death toll figures differed across statements from Kurdish forces and Syrian officials, underscoring the difficulty of confirming casualties while fighting and propaganda claims continue.
US envoy Tom Barrack welcomed the pause and said Washington was working to extend it, reflecting US interest in preventing another cycle of escalation in a country already struggling to stabilize.
