**The Malian military junta maintains firm control of Gao city despite intensified rebel pressure in 2026.** The Azawad Liberation Front (FLA), a Tuareg separatist coalition, and its ally JNIM (an al-Qaeda affiliate) launched coordinated offensives in April and July that recaptured Kidal and enabled ambushes and temporary incursions near Gao and Anefis. These actions inflicted notable casualties on Malian forces and Russian Africa Corps units through convoy attacks and sieges. However, the army repeatedly repelled direct assaults on Gao itself, broke the Anefis blockade with air and ground operations, and conducted counterstrikes that neutralized militant positions. As of late August, Gao remains under government authority while rebels hold greater influence in surrounding rural zones and select northern towns. Malian forces benefit from Russian air support and logistics, which have helped stabilize key urban centers even amid ongoing insurgent activity and supply-line vulnerabilities. Traders appear to view full rebel capture of Gao by year-end as improbable given these defensive successes, the junta’s territorial focus on major population centers, and the absence of a decisive rebel breakthrough in the Gao region since the July clashes. Ongoing counter-insurgency operations and the rebels’ mixed record of holding captured ground further support the current consensus favoring “No.”