With ISIS forces having largely fled out of the towns in Syria’s Deir Ezzor Province and into the desert, they are increasingly carrying out insurgent attacks in the area, and targeting displaced civilians who fled from their former territory into government-held areas.
On Friday, ISIS carried out a car bombing in the area south of the city of Deir Ezzor, attacking a camp where displaced families have fathered between al-Jafra and al-Koniko. At least 20 civilians were killed in the attack, many children, and 30 others wounded.
The city of Deir Ezzor was the only city in the province never fully captured by ISIS, and Syria’s military was able to reverse an ISIS offensive there, expelling them and fairly quickly launching a push along the Euphrates River that’s taken most of ISIS’ remaining territory.
The fighting in many of the towns left them badly damaged or destroyed, and that’s left a lot of civilians displaced, and outside the cities. This has left them in exposed areas, and easy targets for ISIS, who wants to underscore that Syria’s control of the area is very limited.