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The Syrian civil war (Arabic: الحرب الأهلية السورية‎, al-ḥarb al-ʾahlīyah as-sūrīyah) is an ongoing multi-sided civil war in Syria fought between the Ba'athist Syrian Arab Republic led by Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, along with domestic and foreign allies, and various domestic and foreign forces opposing both the Syrian government and each other in varying combinations.The unrest in Syria, which began on 15 March 2011 as part of the wider 2011 Arab Spring protests, grew out of discontent with the Syrian government and escalated to an armed conflict after protests calling for Assad's removal were violently suppressed. The war is being fought by several factions: the Syrian Armed Forces and its domestic and international allies, a loose alliance of mostly Sunni opposition rebel groups (such as the Free Syrian Army), Salafi jihadist groups (including al-Nusra Front and Tahrir al-Sham), the mixed Kurdish-Arab Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). A number of foreign countries, such as Iran, Israel, Russia, Turkey, and the United States, have either directly involved themselves in the conflict or provided support to one or another faction. Iran, Russia, and Hezbollah support the Syrian Arab Republic and the Syrian Armed Forces militarily, with Russia conducting airstrikes and other military operations since September 2015. The U.S.-led international coalition, established in 2014 with the declared purpose of countering ISIL, has conducted airstrikes primarily against ISIL as well as some against government and pro-government targets. They have also deployed special forces and artillery units to engage ISIL on the ground. Since 2015, the U.S. has supported the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria and its armed wing, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), materially, financially, and logistically. At different times, the Turkish state has fought the SDF, ISIL, and the Syrian government since 2016, but has also actively supported the Syrian opposition and occupied large swaths of northwestern Syria while engaging in significant ground combat. Between 2011 and 2017, fighting from the Syrian civil war spilled over into Lebanon as opponents and supporters of the Syrian government traveled to Lebanon to fight and attack each other on Lebanese soil, with ISIL and Al-Nusra also engaging the Lebanese Army. Furthermore, while officially neutral, Israel has exchanged fire with Hezbollah and Iranian forces, whose presence in southwestern Syria it views as a threat. It has also carried out repeated strikes in the rest of Syria since the start of the war, mainly targeting alleged Iranian and Hezbollah militants.International organizations have criticized virtually all sides involved, including the Ba'athist Syrian government, ISIL, opposition rebel groups, Russia, Turkey, and the U.S.-led coalition of severe human rights violations and massacres. The conflict has caused a major refugee crisis. Over the course of the war, a number of peace initiatives have been launched, including the March 2017 Geneva peace talks on Syria led by the United Nations, but fighting has continued.