BEIRUT (AP) — Syrian troops launched a counteroffensive Saturday in an attempt to regain a border crossing point with Turkey a day after it fell in the hands of rebels led by members of an al-Qaida-linked group, activists and state media said.

The rebel capture of the Kassab crossing point in the coastal province of Latakia comes after weeks of government gains to the south along the border with Lebanon. Although the government has had the initiative on the battlefield for most of last year, rebels on Friday opened an offensive in the province of Latakia, the ancestral home of President Bashar Assad’s family and a stronghold of his Alawite sect.