叙利亚最后一个由叛乱分子控制的省份伊德利布省正目睹暴力事件激增，涉及该国近九年内战中的派系以及支持这些派系的国际势力，平民百姓陷入交火之中。

土耳其国防部周四宣布，在伊德利卜的一次空袭中，两名土耳其士兵被打死，另有五名士兵受伤。随后不久，土耳其发表声明称，在报复性袭击中，50名叙利亚士兵被打死，10件装备被摧毁。这一事件引发了更大范围的地区性冲突，此前，土耳其军队与叙利亚军队之间最近发生了致命冲突。

土耳其总统雷杰普·塔伊普·埃尔多安周三警告说，他的部队发动跨境行动，阻止叙利亚军队及其盟友在伊德利卜迅速打击叛军和圣战组织，这只是“时间问题”。这个动荡的西北省份是2011年推翻叙利亚总统巴沙尔·阿萨德(Bashar al-Assad)起义的最后一个堡垒。巴沙尔·阿萨德誓言要在俄罗斯和伊朗的支持下夺回整个叙利亚。

土耳其支持一些叙利亚反对派团体，并已向伊德利卜派遣部队，希望维持2018年与莫斯科达成的停火协议。

据俄罗斯国家通讯社塔斯社报道，俄罗斯总统弗拉基米尔·普京的发言人德米特里·佩斯科夫将土耳其可能对叙利亚发动的全面袭击描述为“最糟糕的情况”。他说:“我们决心继续利用与土耳其同行的工作联系，防止伊德利卜的局势进一步升级。”。

俄罗斯外交部发言人玛丽亚·扎卡罗娃证实，双方周四保持联系，努力防止进一步的敌对行动。然而，事实证明，当地局势越来越不稳定，两个对立的国际角色——美国和伊朗——正试图在这场危机中表明自己的立场。

2月19日拍摄的鸟瞰图显示了伊德利卜省叙利亚城镇伊希姆被摧毁的建筑。西北省是国内和国际力量暴力冲突和利益冲突的战场。

美国

尽管向叙利亚部署了数百名士兵，五角大楼在很大程度上仍处于伊德利布战役的边缘。美国最初支持推翻阿萨德的努力，训练和武装各种反对派团体，但近年来基本上放弃了这一事业，转而支持击败伊斯兰国激进组织(ISIS)，遏制与伊朗结盟的团体的扩散。

美国偶尔会在伊德利卜开展针对基地组织和伊斯兰国目标的行动，包括十月的突袭这导致了伊拉克和沙姆伊斯兰国领导人阿布·巴克尔·巴格达迪的死亡。以美国为首的联军发言人、陆军上校迈尔斯·卡金斯星期四在天空新闻上说，伊德利卜是“恐怖组织的磁石”，对数十万“试图过冬”的平民来说，它是一个“麻烦、威胁和威胁”

唐纳德·特朗普总统和他的官员也一再指责阿萨德在打击叛乱分子的军事行动中犯有战争罪。白宫已经两次下令对叙利亚政府目标进行有限打击，以回应对使用化学武器的指控，包括在伊德利卜。

美国主要支持叙利亚民主力量，这是一支以库尔德人为主的力量，致力于打击伊斯兰国，并从大马士革中央政府那里获得自治权。10月，在针对巴格达迪的行动前几周，特朗普政府将叙利亚政策转向保持对该国东北部油气设施的控制，让美国支持的自卫队与叙利亚政府和俄罗斯达成安全协议。

这组照片显示，2月14日，一架土耳其军用移动火箭发射器从叙利亚阿勒颇省西郊米兹纳兹村附近的一个位置向叙利亚政府军开火。土耳其和叙利亚在内战期间进行了孤立的攻击，但最近的致命交流有可能将两国带入冲突。

土耳其

土耳其认为自卫队的库尔德民兵组织是恐怖分子，因为他们涉嫌与国内被禁止的分离主义分子有联系，土耳其最初在叙利亚北部部署军队打击他们。安卡拉最近将注意力转向了叙利亚亲政府部队，因为他们已经迅速夺回了伊德利卜和邻近的阿勒颇省的边境地区，尤其是在最近几周针锋相对的冲突造成双方人员伤亡之后。

与美国一样，土耳其的军事存在和对非国家行为者的支持被叙利亚视为非法。阿萨德呼吁两国立即撤军，并要求自卫队与他的军队一起击溃最后一批叛乱分子，收复土耳其占领的边境。

自2017年以来，土耳其一直是与俄罗斯和伊朗的三方和平谈判的一部分，但停火协议经常被打破，叙利亚政府经常处于领先地位。面对伊德利卜和阿勒颇的额外收获，那些拒绝与大马士革和解的人无处可逃但是土耳其已经收容了350多万叙利亚难民。

埃尔多安在周三的讲话中表示:“我们不会把伊德利卜交给仍无法理解土耳其在这个问题上的决心的政权，也不会交给那些鼓励它的人。”。

2月17日，叙利亚政府军在阿勒颇北部的勒尔穆恩地区。在俄罗斯的支持下，叙利亚军队和盟军成功夺回了连接四个主要城市的战略M5高速公路，发动了一场猛烈的进攻，进一步孤立了西北部的叛军和圣战分子。

俄罗斯

莫斯科指责安卡拉未能履行承诺，确保伊德利卜的哈亚特·塔里尔·沙姆(Hayat Tahrir al-Sham)联盟等圣战组织撤出并解除武装。因此，俄罗斯军队继续在伊德利卜进行空袭，包括周四对激进分子阵地的新一轮袭击。

事实证明，2015年俄罗斯代表阿萨德进行的干预对叙利亚武装部队来说是决定性的，叙利亚武装部队很快开始在全国范围内逆转反对派和圣战分子的势力。普京试图通过讨好伊朗和土耳其的对手，将军事实力与外交实力相匹配。但最近在伊德利卜发生的暴力事件给联合国支持的建立宪法委员会的努力蒙上了阴影，包括美国在内的世界大国希望该委员会能结束这场战争。

当联合国安理会成员周三在伊德利卜提议人道主义停火时，俄罗斯驻联合国大使瓦西里·内本斯亚提出抗议。这位外交官说:“我们不会停止支持合法政府打击国际恐怖主义的合法斗争。”。他呼吁其他代表支持解除对叙利亚的制裁，支持这个饱受战争蹂躏的国家的重建努力。

在叙利亚的其他地方，俄罗斯军队越来越多地遭遇美国军队，以紧张的相遇达到高潮这个国家东北部的世界主要军事强国之间。周三，在叙利亚亲政府部队和美国人员交火大约一周后，社交媒体上广泛流传的一段视频显示，一辆美国装甲运兵车在一条道路上冲撞一辆俄罗斯宪兵车辆，据报道，该道路靠近东北部城市卡米什利。

2月18日，叙利亚政府军将反叛组织驱逐出叙利亚北部城市郊区和周边地区后，叙利亚人聚集在阿勒颇庆祝，一些人举着总统巴沙尔·阿萨德的海报。在其他地方，估计有90万人逃离阿勒颇和邻近的伊德利布省的军事推进。

伊朗

伊斯兰共和国在争取伊德利卜及其周边地区的战斗中扮演了一个沉默的角色，但与伊朗结盟的组织，如黎巴嫩的什叶派真主党运动，继续在前线打击主要是逊尼派的叛乱。事实证明，自战争初期以来，这些民兵组织在保卫政府阵地方面至关重要，但它们也吸引了德黑兰和大马士革的长期对手进行不必要的干预。

以色列对据称与伊朗有关的阵地和全国各地的合作部队进行了数百次空袭。俄罗斯有时会作为缓冲区尽管它扩大了对以色列行动的公开批评，莫斯科认为这是对叙利亚主权的侵犯。

伊朗也尝试在交战各方之间进行调解。周三，外交部长穆罕默德·贾瓦德·扎里夫告诉半官方的塔西姆通讯社，伊朗“准备与我们的叙利亚和土耳其兄弟就伊德利卜问题在各个层面举行会谈”他提供了他的国家的“斡旋”来帮助两个大国避免冲突。

德黑兰还提出在3月初的某个时候接待来自安卡拉和莫斯科的代表，参加新一轮三方和平谈判。塔斯社周四报道，会议仍在安排之中。

WHAT'S AT STAKE FOR U.S., TURKEY, RUSSIA AND IRAN AS TENSIONS RISE IN WAR-TORN SYRIA

Syria's final insurgent-held province, Idlib, is witnessing a surge in violence involving factions in the country's nearly nine-year civil war as well as the international powers backing them, with civilians caught in the crossfire.

The Turkish Ministry of Defense announced Thursday that two of its soldiers had been killed and five more injured in an airstrike in Idlib, a statement soon followed by the announcement that 50 Syrian troops were killed and 10 pieces of equipment were destroyed in retaliatory strikes. The flare-ups, which raise the possibility of a wider, regional conflict, came after recent deadly clashes between entrenched Turkish forces and advancing Syrian soldiers.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned Wednesday that it was only a "matter of time" before his forces launched a cross-border operation to halt rapid gains by the Syrian military and its allies against rebels and jihadi groups in Idlib. The restive northwestern province is the last bastion of a 2011 uprising to overthrow Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who has vowed to retake the entirety of his country in a campaign backed by Russia and Iran.

Turkey supports some Syrian opposition groups and has already deployed troops to Idlib in hopes of maintaining a cease-fire deal brokered with Moscow in 2018.

Dmitry Peskov, spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin, described a potential full-scale Turkish attack on Syria as "the worst scenario" on Wednesday, according to the state-run Tass news agency. "We are determined to continue to use our working contacts with our Turkish counterparts to prevent the situation in Idlib from escalating further," he said.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova confirmed the two sides were in contact Thursday in an effort to prevent further hostilities. On the ground, however, the situation has proved to be increasingly volatile, and two rival international players—the United States and Iran—are seeking to stake their own claim in the crisis.

An aerial view taken February 19 shows destroyed buildings in the Syrian town of Ihsim in Idlib province. The northwestern province is a battleground for violent encounters and competing interests of both domestic and international forces.

United States

Despite deploying hundreds of troops to Syria, the Pentagon has largely stayed on the sidelines of the fight for Idlib. The U.S. initially supported efforts to oust Assad, training and arming various opposition groups, but it largely abandoned this cause in recent years in favor of defeating the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) and containing the spread of groups aligned with Iran.

The U.S. has occasionally conducted operations in Idlib targeting both Al-Qaeda and ISIS targets, including an October raid that resulted in the death of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Speaking Thursday on Sky News, Army Colonel Myles Caggins, the U.S.-led coalition's spokesman, called Idlib "a magnet for terrorist groups" that are a "nuisance, a menace and a threat" to hundreds of thousands of civilians just "trying to make it through the winter."

President Donald Trump and his officials have also repeatedly accused Assad of committing war crimes in his military campaign against insurgents. The White House has twice ordered limited strikes against Syrian government targets in response to allegations of chemical weapons use, including in Idlib.

The U.S. mainly backs the Syrian Democratic Forces, a majority-Kurdish force focused on battling ISIS and securing autonomy from the central government in Damascus. In October, weeks before the operation against Baghdadi, the Trump administration shifted its Syria policy toward maintaining control over oil and gas facilities in the country's northeast, leaving the U.S.-backed SDF to strike security deals with the Syrian government and the Russians.

This combination of pictures shows a Turkish military mobile rocket launcher firing from a position near the village of Miznaz, on the western outskirts of Syria's Aleppo province, at Syrian government forces on February 14. Turkey and Syria have engaged in isolated attacks over the course of the civil war, but recent deadly exchanges threaten to bring the countries into conflict.

Turkey

Turkey considers the SDF's Kurdish militias to be terrorists because of their alleged ties to banned separatists at home, and it originally deployed troops to northern Syria to combat them. Ankara has more recently turned its attention toward Syrian pro-government forces as they have quickly retaken border areas in Idlib and the neighboring province of Aleppo, especially after tit-for-tat clashes in recent weeks caused fatalities on both sides.

As with the U.S., Turkey's military presence and support for non-state actors are considered illegal by Syria. Assad has called on both countries to withdraw immediately and has asked for the SDF to join his military in routing the last of the insurgents and reclaiming the Turkey-occupied border.

Since 2017, Turkey has been a part of trilateral peace talks along with Russia and Iran, but cease-fire deals have frequently unraveled, with the Syrian government frequently coming out on top. Facing additional gains in Idlib and Aleppo, those refusing to reconcile with Damascus have nowhere else to run but Turkey, which already hosts over three and a half million Syrian refugees.

"We will not abandon Idlib to the regime, which is still unable to grasp Turkey's determination on the issue, or to those who encourage it," Erdogan said during his speech Wednesday.

Syrian government forces in the area of Al-Lirmoun, north of Aleppo, on February 17. Syrian troops and allied forces backed by Russia successfully retook the strategic M5 highway that connects four major cities in an intense assault that further isolated rebels and jihadis in the northwest.

Russia

Moscow has accused Ankara of failing to honor its commitments to ensure the withdrawal and disarmament of jihadi groups such as the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham coalition in Idlib. As a result, Russian forces have continued to conduct airstrikes in Idlib, including fresh raids that took place against militant positions Thursday.

Russia's 2015 intervention on Assad's behalf proved decisive for the Syrian armed forces, which soon began to reverse rebel and jihadi gains nationwide. Putin aimed to match military might with diplomatic prowess by courting his Iranian and Turkish counterparts. But recent violence in Idlib has overshadowed U.N.-endorsed efforts to establish a constitutional committee that world powers, including the U.S., hoped would put an end to the war.

When members of the U.N. Security Council proposed on Wednesday a humanitarian cease-fire in Idlib, Russia's U.N. ambassador, Vasily Nebenzya, protested. "We will not stop supporting the legitimate government which is conducting a legitimate fight against international terrorism," the diplomat said. He called for other representatives to support the lifting of sanctions against Syria and back reconstruction efforts for the war-torn country.

Elsewhere in Syria, Russian forces were increasingly running into their U.S. counterparts, culminating in tense encounters between the world's leading military powers in the country's northeast. On Wednesday, about a week after a firefight between Syrian pro-government troops and U.S. personnel, a video widely circulated on social media Wednesday showed a U.S. armored personnel carrier ramming a Russian military police vehicle off a road, reportedly near the northeastern city of Qamishli.

Syrians, some carrying posters of President Bashar al-Assad, gather to celebrate in Aleppo on February 18 after government forces ousted rebel groups from suburbs and areas around the northern Syrian city. Elsewhere, an estimated 900,000 people fled military advances in Aleppo and the neighboring Idlib province.

Iran

The Islamic Republic has played a muted role in the battle for Idlib and its peripheries, but Iran-aligned groups such as Lebanon's Shiite Hezbollah movement continue to fight on the front lines against the mostly Sunni insurgency. Such militias have proved vital in defending government positions since the early days of the war, but they have also attracted unwanted intervention from a longtime adversary of both Tehran and Damascus.

Israel has conducted hundreds of airstrikes against positions said to be associated with Iran and partnered forces across the country. Russia has at times served as a buffer zone between the two archenemies, though it has amplified its public criticism of Israel's campaign, which Moscow considers a violation of Syria's sovereignty.

Iran too has tried its hand at mediation between belligerents. Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told the semiofficial Tasnim News Agency on Wednesday that Iran was "prepared to hold talks with our Syrian and Turkish brothers about Idlib at various levels." He offered his country's "good offices" to help the two powers avoid a collision course.

Tehran has also offered to host representatives from Ankara and Moscow for a new round of their three-way peace talks sometime in early March. The meeting was still in the process of being arranged, Tass reported Thursday.