Tag Archives: Kurdish Fighters

Kurds Hold off I.S. in Kobani as Fighters Strike in Iraq

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 Kurdish defenders held off Islamic State militants in Syria’s border town of Kobani on Sunday, but the fighters struck with deadly bombings in Iraq, killing dozens of Kurds in the north and assassinating a provincial police commander in the west.

The top U.S. military officer suggested that Washington, which has ruled out joining ground combat in either Iraq or Syria, could nevertheless increase its role “advising and assisting” Iraqi troops on the ground in the future.

U.S. National Security Adviser Susan Rice said in a television interview that Turkey agreed to let bases be used by coalition forces for activities inside Iraq and Syria and to train moderate Syrian rebels in the fight against Islamic State.

A U.S.-led military coalition has been bombing Islamic State fighters who hold swathes of territory in both Iraq and Syria, countries involved in complex multi-sided civil wars in which nearly every country in the Middle East has a stake.

After days of Islamic State advances, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said Kobani’s Kurdish defenders had managed to hold their ground. The Observatory said 36 Islamic State fighters, all foreigners, were killed the previous day, while eight Kurdish fighters had died. The figures could not be independently verified.

 

ISIS Seize Parts of Key Syrian Town

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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.

Kurds battle ISIS for Key Syria Town

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Kurdish fighters backed by US-led air strikes battled Islamic State jihadists for control of a key Syrian town Sunday, while Turkey evacuated some border areas as mortar fire spilled over.

ISIS fighters seized part of a strategic hill overlooking the town of Kobane late on Saturday, a monitor said, but their progress was slowed by new strikes from the coalition of Washington and Arab allies.

A Kobane local official, Idris Nahsen, said ISIS fighters were just one kilometre (less than a mile) from the town and that air strikes alone were not enough to stop them.

He complained of a lack of coordination between the coalition and Kurdish fighters of the ground.

The dusty border town has become a crucial battleground in the international fight against ISIS, which sparked further outrage this weekend with the release of a video showing the beheading of Briton Alan Henning.