Operation "Great Dawn" - the end of ISIS in Homs and Deir Ez-Zor

The Syrian Arab Army has just launched an enormous offensive against ISIS around Palmyra called Operation "Great Dawn," and it will signal the end of ISIS in Homs and Deir Ez-Zor provinces.

Operation "Great Dawn" is the largest offensive by the Syrian Arab Army against ISIS for the entirety of the Syrian Civil War. It has been made possible by the inter-Syrian talks in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan, in which de-escalation zones were agreed upon, freeing up Syrian Arab Army from fighting Al-Qaeda and their affiliates to focus on fighting ISIS.

The impact of this operation is comparable to the Battle of Aleppo in importance: it will solidify Bashar Al-Assad's control of the majority of Syrian territory and will rescue the besieged city of Deir Ez-Zor from ISIS' hands.

Already ISIS have lost 3000 square kilometers in the space of 48 hours. This goes to show that the Syrian Arab Army, when not besieged by Al-Qaeda, are more than a match for ISIS in Syria.

In the next few weeks of bitter fighting, expect the Syrian Arab Army to regain control of the entirety of the Homs and Deir Ez-Zor countryside, shrinking ISIS' so called Caliphate by 50%. Also expect that the US-backed Syrian rebels fighting ISIS will be cut off from reaching their objective on the Iraqi border.

ISIS will likely be forced into the Raqqa countryside, where they will fight to the bitter end of their Caliphate. This will create more problems for the Syrian Democratic Forces, who have so far had an easy fight against ISIS by letting their fighters out of Raqqa to fight the Syrian Arab Army in Homs and Deir Ez-Zor. But with the Syrian Arab Army out in full-force against ISIS in Homs and Deir Ez-Zor, ISIS will likely retreat to the Raqqa countryside, as battling the Kurds will be easier than battling the Syrian Arab Army.

The conclusion of the operation will likely cut ISIS' Caliphate in half, separating the Syrian and Iraqi halves from each other. This blow will be detrimental to the legitimacy of ISIS, and likely force Caliph Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi from Syria back into Iraq.