response to these attacks around Rankous and Asal al-Ward, the Syrian EFTA00669745 regime and Hezbollah launched an offensive on June 21 to clear Qalamoun, where an estimated 3,000 rebel fighters remain. Tony Badran, a Hezbollah expert with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, believes that the

by ISIS. In November, a Syrian government campaign with the support of Hezbollah allowed them to retake the town of Yabroud in Syria's mountainous Qalamoun region, a crucial car-bomb-making hub for those targeting Hezbollah in the Bekaa Valley and in Beirut. Combined with a security plan enacted by Leb