Beirut: Warplanes struck an opposition-held area in Syria’s southwestern Dara’a province on Tuesday, a war monitor and local activists reported, a military escalation in territory where government forces are threatening a major offensive.

The raids hit the area of Al Masika village in Dara’a province. Clashes were also underway in the area.

Rebel forces control swathes of territory in southwestern Syria, which borders Jordan and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

Syria’s multi-sided war has pivoted towards the southwest in recent weeks, risking escalation in an area of major concern to Israel where the conflict has been contained since last year by an agreement underwritten by the United States and Russia.

While a notable escalation, Rami Abdul Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said the air strikes did not yet appear to mark the start of the big offensive that government forces and their allies have been mobilising for.

The United States last week warned it would “take firm and appropriate measures” in response to government violations of the so-called “de-escalation” agreement in the southwest.

Israel has been demanding that Iranian and Iran-backed forces such as Lebanon’s Hezbollah be kept away from the Golan frontier, and removed from Syria more widely.

President Bashar Al Assad said earlier this month he was giving a chance for political talks to resolve the situation in the southwest, though if these failed the government would resort to force to take back the territory.

Meanwhile, rebel shellfire slammed into the southern Syrian city of Sweida on Tuesday for the first time in three years, a monitor said, as fresh regime reinforcements arrived in the area.

The government holds most of Sweida province but rebels still control much of the nearby Dara’a and Quneitra governorates.

On Tuesday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said opposition forces fired shells into Sweida city, “which led to loud blasts but no casualties.”

“It is the first time since 2015 that the city has been subjected to shellfire,” said Observatory chief Rami Abdul Rahman.

Syrian state news agency Sana also blamed rebels “spread out in the towns and villages in eastern parts of Dara’a province” for firing shells on Sweida.

Sweida, whose residents are mostly from the Druze minority, has remained relatively insulated from seven years of war that ravaged the rest of the country.

But rebels hold a sliver of territory in western Sweida that borders their main bastion in the province of Dara’a, and clashes and exchanges of fire have erupted in that area in recent days.

Syria’s government has set its sights on ousting rebels from the south and has been dispatching troops and equipment there for weeks.

On Tuesday, they dropped new flyers on the rebel-held half of Dara’a city, calling on residents to expel rebels, “like your brothers did in Eastern Ghouta and Qalamun,” referring to two areas near Damascus recently recaptured from the opposition.

Rebels appeared to fear the regime would use Sweida’s civilian population as justification for the assault, and issued a message addressed to them on Tuesday.

“We call on our people in Sweida province not to serve as bait for the goals of the regime, sectarian militias from Iran, and Hezbollah, which are trying to occupy this land and divide its people,” they said in a statement.

But the government has also hinted that a political settlement over the south’s fate could be reached.

“We have moved towards the south and we are giving the political process a chance,” Syrian President Bashar Al Assad said last week.

“If that doesn’t succeed, we have no other option but to liberate it by force.”

— Agencies