Hezbollah has been taking a beating lately.

Via Al Arabiya:

At least forty Hezbollah fighters and Syrian soldiers have been killed in recent clashes with opposition fighters in the strategic town of al-Qusayr in Homs province, activists said on Saturday.

In clashes with Syrian troops in Qusayr, the opposition fighters described on Friday what they called the “biggest intervention” by Lebanese militant movement, Hezbollah, in the two-year conflict that started as protests against President Bashar al-Assad but morphed into a civil war.

Qusayr is a contested central Syrian town near a key highway between Damascus and the coast.

According to the activists, Hezbollah fighters used Syrian government aircraft as backup to take control over large areas in the Tal al-Nabi, described as occupying the highest hill in the Qusayr region.

The fierce fighting in Qusayr, which is located along the Syrian-Lebanese border, was followed by the deployment of Syrian soldiers, who were also backed by warplanes, on Friday.

Government troops have stepped up counterattacks against opposition forces threatening regime supply lines on the country’s frontiers.