British forces in Syria, Assad presidential compound said under attack

Unconfirmed first reports from British, French and Turkish sources say
British special operations forces crossed from Turkey into northern
Syria today, and advanced up to 10 kilometers inside the country. The
same sources report heavy fighting around the Presidential Guards
compound on the outskirts of Damascus.
Military sources note that this compound exists to defend Bashar
Assad’s presidential palace  overlooking Damascus.
British and Gulf TV stations are again running interviews with dozens
of Syrian soldiers taken prisoner by rebel forces and transferred to
Free Syrian Army centers in South Turkey. But this time, they are
being aired in conjunction with those two developments, indicating
pivotal and coordinated military action inside the embattled country,
or even the start of western intervention against the Assad regime.
Later Tuesday, Gulf military sources confirmed the presence of British
special forces in Syria.  .
The reported British incursion, if confirmed, occurred at the tail end
of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s 24-hour visit to Israel Tuesday
morning and would have posed a direct challenge to his repeated
warning that Moscow would not tolerate Western military intervention
in Syria and actively prevent it. Similar warnings have issued from
Tehran.
As for the timing, the double military drive against Assad also
occurred hours before a NATO “consultation” in Brussels on the
shooting down of a Turkish warplane by Syria last Friday, June 22,
which Ankara stated Monday “must not go unpunished.”

The two-pronged operation – the reported British incursion and major
clash at the front door of Assad’s presidential palace – would appear
to be designed to widen the cracks in his regime and speed its final
breakup.