Islamist-led rebels battle Syria troops near key city of Hama

Islamist-led rebels battled army troops on Tuesday as they advanced towards the city of Hama in central Syria, a war monitor said.

Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and its allies fought some of the "most violent" clashes with troops in the area since launching a lightning offensive last week, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor.

Since they launched their offensive last week, they have snatched swathes of territory from the Syrian government, including second city Aleppo.

"Clashes have erupted in the northern Hama countryside, where rebel factions managed to seize several cities and towns in the last few hours," said the Britain-based monitor, which has a network of sources inside Syria.

"Syrian and Russian air forces carried out dozens of strikes on the area," it added.

Russia first intervened directly in Syria's war in 2015 with strikes on rebel-held area, and has pledged continued support for President Bashar al-Assad since the latest flare-up started.

State news agency SANA also reported air strikes on Hama province and rebel bastion Idlib in the northwest.

Hama is a strategic city linking Aleppo to the capital Damascus.

It was a bastion of opposition to the Assad government early on in the civil war and the site of frequent mass protests.

For many of the city's residents, the scars of the 1982 massacre by the army, aimed at crushing the banned Muslim Brotherhood, have also yet to heal.

An AFP journalist in the northern Hama countryside saw dozens of Syrian army tanks and military vehicles abandoned by the side of the road leading to Hama.

"We want to advance on Hama after combing" towns that have been captured, a rebel fighter who identified himself as Abu al-Huda al-Sourani told AFP.

A rebel takeover of Hama would "pose a threat to the regime's popular base", Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said.

The province's western countryside is home to the Alawite community from which Assad hails.

The U.N. says nearly 50,000 people have been displaced by the fighting that has killed hundreds, mostly fighters, since the end of November.

Syria has been at war since Assad cracked down on democracy protests in 2011.