Free Syrian Army forces pounded strategic military airport of Hama city with more than 40 Grad rockets, rebel news feeds said Sunday.
Hama military airport is not operating due to heavy surface-to-surface rockets attack, source told Zaman al-Wasl.
Jaish al-Naser, key moderate rebel group operating in northern Hama countryside, adopted the attack, that pushed regime and Russia to deport advanced helicopters to Shayrat airfield in central Homs province.
Rebel Twitter accounts said Grad strikes were in response to regime attacks on liberated civilian areas in Hama countryside.
On Saturday, FSA factions recaptured ground lost to favor of regime forces this week in Hama amid heavy aerial bombing by regime air force, field sources said.
At least 10 regime troops killed in the rebels counterattack south of Helfaya town. Two tanks and armored vehicles were also destroyed.
Last week, Syrian or Russian warplanes dropped incendiary bombs on areas of Idlib and Hama provinces just days after a deadly Sarin gas attack on Khan Sheikhoun town .
The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Russian jets had used an incendiary substance called thermite in bombs they dropped over the towns of Saraqeb in Idlib and al-Latamenah in Hama, further south.
In September, rebels were supplied with surface-to-surface Grad rockets in response to the Russian-backed offensive in Aleppo, according to Fares al-Bayoush, rebel commander of the Free Syrian Army.
Rockets for the Grad BM-21 multilaunch systems with ranges of 22km and 40km have recently been supplied in "excellent quantities," Reuters reported, citing Colonel al-Bayoush. The colonel did not specify exactly how many rockets had been received
