Syrian government forces pressed an offensive in al Rashedeen district west of Aleppo on Tuesday with ground fighting and air strikes as part of a push to retake all of the city's besieged rebel-held east, rebels and a monitoring group said.
The forces launched three airstrikes targeting militants’ hideouts west of Reef Aleppo. No casualties have been reported.
Syrian government and allied forces have in the last two weeks driven rebels from most of their territory in what was once Syria's most populous city. The rebels have controlled the eastern section since 2012, and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said in an interview published on Thursday that retaking Aleppo would change the course of the civil war across the whole country.
 A military source told Arab Today: "Until now 32 neighborhoods have been liberated out of an original 40 in east Aleppo... The advance is going according to plan and is sometimes faster than expected."
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the conflict, said government rocket attacks continued overnight into Friday morning on frontline areas of east Aleppo.
During a tour of Old Aleppo, journalists counted the sound of nine air raids in about half an hour.
A witness in rebel-held Aleppo said there were intense clashes in Sheikh Saeed on Tuesday. That is in the south of the eastern sector, where the Observatory and a Syrian military source said government forces advanced on Thursday.