Syrian government forces under Bashar al-Assad have suffered a series of setbacks in recent weeks, in part due to Islamic State shifting its focus from Iraq – where it suffered a major defeat in Tikrit – to the battlegrounds of western and central Syria. A few major recent developments include:

• The Fall of Idlib. Though it has little strategic value, Idlib is a provincial capital that had been held by the government since the start of the war. The city fell to a coalition of Islamist opposition groups headed by the al-Nusra Front and including Ahrar al-Sham. Its fall means that the Syrian army will likely retreat from the north to fortify positions along the western coast (the homeland of al-Assad’s alawite sect) and central Syria. Capturing Idlib is a big victory for the Islamists, but theirs is a fragile coalition that will be difficult to keep together moving forward.