Islamic State jihadists pushed into the key Syrian town of Kobane on the Turkish border, seizing three districts in the city’s east after fierce street fighting with its Kurdish defenders.
Kobane, also known as Ain al-Arab, has become a strategic battleground between the IS group and its opponents, who include the United States and its Western and Arab allies.
Fresh air strikes by the US-led coalition on Tuesday hit positions held by Islamic State jihadists in the southwest of Kobane, according to an AFP journalist just across the border in Turkey. Taking Kobane would give the IS organisation control of a long stretch of the Syria-Turkey border.
The jihadists launched their latest assault on Kobane after a three-week siege with a wave of suicide bomb attacks, Mustefa Ebdi, a Kurdish activist from the town, said on his Facebook page.
After penetrating the city, they waged street battles against Kurdish defenders, sending hundreds of civilians fleeing towards the Turkish border, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
“They have taken the industrial zone, Maqtala al-Jadida and Kani Arabane in eastern Kobane after violent combat with Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) fighters” who had far fewer men and arms, said the Observatory.
Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said street battles were now being fought in the south and west of Kobane.
IS jihadists had “retreated by a few streets in the eastern areas they seized yesterday, but the fighting has now spread to the south and west of the town,” Abdel Rahman said.
He said IS fighters had seized a number of buildings in the south and west of the town, including a hospital under construction on the western outskirts of Kobane.
Kobane activist Mustafa Ebdi said the latest air strikes had little effect.
“The strikes hit the Mishtenur area,” he said, referring to a plateau south of Kobane.
“But they (IS) aren’t gathered there. There are other places they should be hitting,” he said.
Kurdish fighters meanwhile ordered all civilians to evacuate Kobane, Mustafa Bali, a spokesman for Kurds in the city, told AFP, adding that some 2,000 people had left the city.
