The Syrian army and its allies have engaged ISIL fighters in the armed group's last central bastion, a day after taking the heavily defended village of Uqairabat, a monitor repocrted.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, reported on Saturday that the army and its allies had also taken other villages in the area, aided by Russian helicopters.
The enclave lies close to the main road running, between the cities of Homs and Aleppo near the town of al-Salamiya, and has been the site of intense fighting for months.
Evicting the armed fighters from the area is viewed as necessary to improve security on the road.
The Syrian army, aided by Russian airstrikes and Iran-backed Shia militias including Lebanon's Hezbollah, had made advances deep into eastern Syria this year against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (also known as ISIS). 
It is pushing to relieve its besieged enclave in the city of Deir Ezzor, one of the cities on the Euphrates to which ISIL has fallen back after losses in both Syria and Iraq, but has left the pocket in central Syria in its rear.
Late on Friday, a military media unit run by Hezbollah said the army had captured Uqairabat, which it described as ISIL's stronghold in that region.