The 4th Armoured Division of the Syrian Arab Army is advancing on positions of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (formerly Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda) in the strategic area of Bardaya Hills in the western Damascus countryisde, near the Golan Heights.
According to pro-government sources, the 4th Armoured Division overrun the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) positions in the eatern part of the hills and entered the area. An intense fighting is ongoing.
Bardaya Hills are located east of the town of Bayat Jin, the key HTS stronghold in the area. Pro-government sources speculate that the recent advances will allow government forces to develop momentum further and to laid siege on the HTS-held town. However, clashes have been ongoing in the hills area for few months without any significant progress of the Syrian military in this area.
More about the 4th Armoured Division (this video was originally released on June 10, 2017):
Tally ho! Chaps.
So they’re back from having served in Deir Ezzor province? Last thing I heard they were deployed to the bridgehead across the Euphrates opposite Deir Ezzor.
Elements of the 4th Mechanized were reported as arriving in Deir Ezzore from central Syria in October and they were involved in crossing the Euphrates toward Omar oil fields. But in immediate months prior the 42nd Brigade of the 4th Mechanized were sent into operations around east Damascus – Jobar and Ayn Tarma. So assume that different brigade elements of the 4th Mechanized were deployed quite separately at times – in distant sectors. This seems to tally with current reports that it is indeed the 42nd Brigade of the 4th Mechanized, that had been relatively close by in east Damascus, that are now in operations against HTS position near the Golan Heights.
https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/elite-syrian-army-formation-arrives-east-damascus-battle-key-suburbs-restarted/
https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/elite-syrian-army-division-crosses-euphrates-join-race-al-umar-oil-fields/
https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/syrian-army-storms-last-jihadist-bastion-near-occupied-golan-heights/
I suspect the 4th armored division is not so much an actual combat unit, like the Tigers, as more of an HQ controlling a group of elite regime units. Which sometimes a part of get dispatched to Daraa, sometimes a part to Deir Ezzor, but it would appear mostly are kept around Damascus.