The future of Kabul, as so often in Afghanistan's turbulent history, hangs in the balance. Last week opposition forces advanced to within 20 km of the capital, a gain of some 37 miles.
But since Friday there has been little fighting beyond exchanges of artillery and rocket fire and no movement on the front line.
The opposition, under Gen Ahmad Shah Masood, has not pressed its advantage, allowing the Taliban to reinforce its new front line.
"Masood has not tried to come any closer to Kabul, and the Taliban have not made a concerted effort to push him out of the areas he captured," one commentator in Kabul said.
The Taliban, a purist Muslim movement which grew out of the Afghan refugee camps of northwestern Pakistan, drove Gen Masood's men out of Kabul last September and imposed its strict interpretation of Islam on the city of more than a million people.
The analyst said he believed both sides had serious weaknesses that made it difficult for them to take decisive measures.
"Masood is relatively isolated. The opposition alliance [of which Gen Masood's party is one of three members] is politically not very strong and, even if he could take Kabul, I'm not sure he could hold it on his own," he said.
"But the Taliban have their weaknesses also. They have been hit by a string of recent defeats, losing a lot of men and material. The morale of the front line troops has taken a severe knock."
The analyst, who asked to remain anonymous, said he believed Gen Masood was trying to work out a joint plan of attack with the mainly Shia Muslim Hezb-eWahadat party.
Hezb-e-Wahadat has its stronghold in the central Afghan province of Bamiyan, and is fighting the Taliban on a front line in the mountains west of Kabul.
"I think Masood is trying to work out a joint plan with Wahadat so that they can launch a combined attack on the Taliban. There are also indications that he is planning something in the east of the country, perhaps to try to cut the road to Pakistan," he said.
The road east from Kabul to the Pakistan border is Kabul's main supply route. The Taliban has taken advantage of the hiatus in the opposition attacks north of Kabul to bring in more men and equipment and to dig in.
The fighting has been taking place in the broad and fertile Shomali valley that runs north from Kabul into the foothills of the Hindu Kush mountains. The opposition has moved further south on the western side of the valley than the eastern.
Taliban guns and multiple rocket launchers on the eastern side of the Shomali have been pounding their enemies on the other side of the valley. The Taliban has tightened up security in Kabul. They have arrested large numbers of citizens, who they say will be investigated for helping the opposition.
The arrests provoked a protest from the civil rights group Amnesty International on Friday.
Amnesty accused the Taliban, which is dominated by the Pashtun ethnic group, of arresting members of the Tajik and Hazara minorities on ethnic grounds.
"There are no reports that these men were involved in fighting. Information received indicates that these men have been detained solely because of their identity as minority Tajiks and Hazaras," the Amnesty statement said.
"We would therefore consider them prisoners of conscience and demand their immediate and unconditional release."
Masood's party is dominated by Tajiks, and its ally Hezb-eWahadat by Hazaras.
Many international aid staff have evacuated to neighbouring Pakistan. But most of the aid projects are still running.
Among other projects, international aid provides substantial food supplements to almost half of Kabul's civilian population. The analyst says neither side can allow the military situation to continue as it stands.
"The Taliban cannot allow Masood to stay where he is. He is now in a position to rocket Kabul for the first time in nine months and they cannot allow that," he said.
"Similarly Masood is too vulnerable where he is under the Taliban guns, he has to either move forward or retreat," he added. - (Reuter)