ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD

[Anthea]

Reuters

Kurds seize Iraq/Syria border post; Sunni tribe joins fight against Islamic State
By Isabel Coles and Jonny Hogg

Iraqi Kurdish troops drove Islamic State fighters from a strategic border crossing with Syria on Tuesday and won the support of members of a major Sunni tribe, in one of the biggest successes since U.S. forces began bombing the fighters.

The victory, which could make it harder for militants to operate on both sides of the frontier, was also achieved with help from Kurds from the Syrian side of the frontier, a new sign of cooperation across the border.

Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga fighters took control of the Rabia border crossing in a battle that began before dawn, an Iraqi Kurdish political source said.

"It's the most important strategic point for crossing. Once that's taken it's going to cut the supply route and make the operation to reach Sinjar easier," the source said, referring to a mountain further south where members of the Yazidi minority sect have been trapped by Islamic State fighters.

The participation of Sunni tribal fighters in battle against Islamic State could prove as important a development as the advance itself.

Members of the influential Shammar tribe, one of the largest in northwestern Iraq, joined the Kurds in the fighting, a tribal figure said.

"Rabia is completely liberated. All of the Shammar are with the Peshmerga and there is full cooperation between us," Abdullah Yawar, a leading member of the tribe, told Reuters.

He said the cooperation was the result of an agreement with the president of Iraq's Kurdish region after three months of negotiation to join forces against the "common enemy".

Gaining support from Sunni tribes, many of which either supported or acquiesced in Islamic State's June advance, would be a crucial objective for the Iraqi government and its regional and Western allies in the fight against the insurgents.

WINNING OVER SUNNI TRIBES

Winning over Sunni tribes was a central part of the strategy that helped the U.S. military defeat a precursor of Islamic State during the "surge" campaign of 2006-2007. Washington has made clear it hopes the new Iraqi government of Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi, who took power last month, can repeat it.

Rabia controls the main highway linking Syria to Mosul, the biggest city in northern Iraq, which Islamic State fighters captured in June at the start of a lightning advance through Iraq's Sunni Muslim north that jolted the Middle East.

Twelve Islamic State fighters' bodies lay on the border at the crossing after the battle, said Hemin Hawrami head of the foreign relations department of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, one of the main Iraqi Kurdish parties, on Twitter.

Syrian Kurdish fighters said they had also joined the battle: "We are defending Rabia ... trying to coordinate action with the Peshmerga against Islamic State. It is true," said Saleh Muslim, head of the Syria-based Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD).

If Rabia can be held, its recapture is one of the biggest successes since U.S.-led forces started bombing Islamic State targets in Iraq in August.

It is one of two main border crossings between militant-held parts of the two countries, control of which has allowed Islamic State to declare a single Caliphate on both sides. The other main crossing, Albu Kamal on the Euphrates River valley highway, has been a primary target of U.S. strikes on both sides of the frontier this past week.The ability to cross the frontier freely has been a major tactical advantage for Islamic State fighters on both sides. Fighters swept from Syria into northern Iraq in June and returned with heavy weapons seized from fleeing Iraqi government troops, which they have used to expand their territory in Syria.

Washington expanded the campaign to Syria last week in an effort to defeat the fighters who have swept through Sunni areas of both countries, killing prisoners, chasing out Kurds and ordering Shi'ites and non-Muslims to convert or die.

In two complex, multi-sided civil wars, the Sunni fighters are battling against Shi'ite-backed government in both countries, rival Sunni groups in Syria and separate Kurdish forces on either side of the frontier.

Washington hopes the strikes, conducted with help from European allies in Iraq and Arab air forces in Syria, will allow government and Kurdish forces in Iraq, and moderate Sunnis in Syria, to recapture territory.

In Iraq, a coalition of Iraqi army, Shi'ite militia fighters and Kurdish troops known as peshmerga have been slowly recapturing Sunni villages that had been under Islamic State control south of the Kurdish-held oil city of Kirkuk.

"At dawn today, two villages near Daquq, 40 kilometres south of Kirkuk, Peshmerga forces liberated them from Islamic State," an Iraqi security official said.

Islamic State fighters had used positions in the villages to fire mortars at neighbouring Daquq, a town populated mainly by ethnic Turkmen Shi'ite Muslims. When Kurdish fighters entered the villages they were empty, the security official said.

GROUND SHAKING BENEATH OUR FEET

Peshmerga secretary-general Jabbar Yawar estimated the Iraqi Kurds had now retaken around half the territory they lost when the militants surged north towards the regional capital Arbil in early August, an advance that helped to prompt the U.S. strikes.

"We have absorbed the shock and are pushing them back," Yawar said. Peshmerga fighters, Iraqi army troops and pro-government militia were advancing north from the Peshmerga-held city of Tuz Khurmatu to drive Islamic State fighters out of the countryside that surrounds Kirkuk, the official said. He credited U.S.-led air strikes with helping the peshmerga clear the two villages.

"This area witnessed intense air strikes from U.S.-led strikes and Iraqi air strikes overnight and at dawn," the official said.

The explosions shook Kirkuk itself: "We felt the ground shaking beneath our feet, and then we heard that there were air strikes outside Kirkuk," said a policeman in the city contacted by Reuters who asked not to be identified.

In addition to aiding the Kurds in the north, U.S. air strikes have targeted fighters west of Baghdad and on its southern outskirts, difficult rural terrain known under U.S. occupation as the "triangle of death".

"We believe the U.S. air strikes have helped in containing Islamic State's momentum," said lawmaker Mowaffak al-Rubaie, a former head of Iraq's advisory security council.

Iraqi officials said U.S. air strikes, along with strikes by Iraq's own aircraft, had killed dozens of Islamic State fighters the previous day south of the capital.

"It appears that 67 (Islamic State) militants were killed in Fadiliya," said an Iraqi security source, referring to a town in the Euphrates valley south of the capital. He said the casualty estimate came from satellite imagery and informants.

The U.S. military said it had conducted 11 air strikes in Syria and the same number in Iraq in the previous 24 hours, describing a range of targets including Islamic State tanks, artillery, checkpoints and buildings.

SIEGE IN SYRIA

Unlike in Iraq, where the U.S.-led air strikes are coordinated closely with the government and Kurdish forces, Washington has no powerful allies on the ground in Syria, making its strategy there riskier and more precarious.

The United States and its Western and Arab allies oppose the government of President Bashar al-Assad and are wary of helping him by hurting his enemies. Turkey, the neighbour with the biggest military, has so far held back from joining the U.S.-led coalition, despite an advance in the past 10 days by Islamic State fighters against Kurds near the frontier that has caused the fastest refugee exodus of the three-year civil war.

The fighters have laid siege to Kobani, a Kurdish city on Syria's border with Turkey. The rattle of sporadic gunfire could be heard from across the frontier, and a shell could be seen exploding in olive groves on the western outskirts of town.

A steady stream of people, mostly men, were crossing the border post back into Syria, apparently to help defend the town.

Ocalan Iso, deputy commander of the Kurdish forces defending the town, told Reuters Kurdish troops had battled Islamic State fighters armed with tanks through the night and into Tuesday.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a body that monitors the war with a network on the ground, said U.S.-led strikes had hit Islamic State positions west of Kobani. Kurdish commanders have complained in recent days that the air strikes hitting other parts of Syria were not helping them at the front.

The Observatory said Islamic State now controls 325 out of 354 villages on the rural outskirts of Kobani.

(Additional reporting by Yara Bayoumy, Raheem Salman and Ned Parker in Baghdad and Oliver Holmes in Beirut; Writing by Ned Parker and Peter Graff)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/ ... 2G20140930

[Anthea]

Rudaw

Syrian Minister: We Could Not Defend Kobane Because of Turkey
By DİLXWAZ BEHLEWÎ

Ali Haidar,Syria’s State Minister for National Reconciliation, said in an exclusive interview with Rudaw that his government could not help stop the Islamic State’s (IS/ ISIS) onslaught against the Kurdish city of Kobane because of a stand-off with Turkey near the border. “Our air force could not fly there close to their borders,” he said. Haidar also added that US support for the Free Syrian Army (FSA), which is fighting to overthrow the Damascus regime, was a mistake: “What the US is trying to do is to replace a terrorist group with another, he warned. Here is an edited transcript of his comments:

Rudaw: At the moment more than 300,000 people have fled Kobane. In the last week alone, the IS captured many surrounding villages. Why didn’t the Syrian air force target the IS there?

Ali Haidar: Kobane is a Syrian city, which lies very close to the Turkish border. We have a standoff with the Turkish government and this is why our air force could not fly there close to their borders. There are no Syrian government decisions to overlook border cities. This is just a military issue; our army cannot reach there.

Rudaw: Does this mean that you think the Turkish anti-aircraft guns will target your planes if you fly too close to the Turkish borders?

Ali Haidar: Yes, we do. The Turkish and Israeli militaries so far have downed two Syrian aircraft. They have shelled our troops in the past, accusing us of crossing their borders, which is not true. The real reason was for them to aid the opposition groups.

Rudaw: How do you assess the Turkish government’s involvement in the Kobane battle?

Ali Haidar: Turkey has been aggressive from the start. Turkey is to a great extent responsible for what has happened in Syria. It opened its 800-kilometer borders with Syria in order to facilitate the inflow of foreign fighters into Syria. It also has supported the opposition both economically and militarily and in the media. According to the UN resolution, the Turkish government should halt its support for the terrorist groups in Syria. It should close all its borders or monitor it to stop the entry of fighters into the Syrian war.

Rudaw: What is the position of the Syrian government about the US-led airstrikes on IS bases inside Syria?

Ali Haidar: We fully supported the Security Council’s resolution at the time which strongly condemned the IS atrocities. We support any international effort to destroy terrorist groups such as the IS and al-Nusrah Front. But our conditions must be taken into consideration. This means that the Syrian state institutions and the Syrian army bases should not be targeted at any event. In other words, there should be complete coordination with the Syrian government. What we so far have seen is this: the airstrikes have been in coordination with the Syrian government and with our prior knowledge. The coalition countries have respected the Syrian requests. Indeed, attacking the terrorists is also in the interest of the Syrian government, especially considering the fact that some of the countries that now attack IS, we believe, are responsible for its creation in the first place -- at least on a moral level.

Rudaw: How would you describe your direct or indirect cooperation with the coalition countries?

Ali Haidar: As the Syrian foreign ministry announced earlier, we were notified of the attacks in advance by our ambassador to the UN, Dr. Bashar Jaafari. We had also consultations with the Iraqi government regarding the ongoing events in Syria.

Rudaw: Russia said the attacks were not lawful. Even the Iranian president criticized Syria for allowing the attacks to take place. How do you regard these comments?

Ali Haidar: I understand the Iranian and Russian positions, because I know they want to see the full implementation of international resolutions. We said that this (the attacks) were a step in the right direction. But indeed we also said that there should be coordination with all the involved parties in the region. What Iran and Russia have said is that full coordination has not taken place with the international community. Surely, the coalition on the international level should also represent the UN’s Security Council.

Rudaw: How do you regard the Saudi airstrikes on the IS bases in Syria, considering the fact that Saudi Arabia has condemned Syrian government’s actions in the past?

Ali Haidar: As far as we are concerned, we are dealing with the Security Council’s resolution against terror. We are not against either Saudis, nor the Turks or Qataris, or Jordanians for that matter, to join the attacks on IS. These countries were the reason the IS was formed originally. If they now join the attacks on IS, then it’s a good thing. All these countries were funding and training the IS fighters and sent them over to Syria to fight against our government. But now fearing for their own security, they have joined the airstrikes. They don’t do this for the Syrian people; they are in the fight for themselves.

Rudaw: What is your position regarding the decision by the US government and its allies to aid the Syrian moderate opposition with $500 million? They have announced that there will be training camps for the Free Syrian Army in Saudi Arabia.

Ali Haidar: What the US is trying to do is to replace a terrorist group with another terrorist group. We don’t differentiate between terrorist organizations and the so-called moderate organizations because they have one thing in common, which is the killing. We are monitoring the events. We oppose anything that harms the Syrian national interests. At the moment an international coalition is attacking the terrorist organizations and we are benefitted by it. But this should not be done at the expense of the Syrian interests. They must not meddle in the internal affairs of Syria. The US doesn’t have so much to say about the internal problems in Syria.

Rudaw: If the US started arming the Syrian moderate opposition, will you react to that?

Ali Haidar: Indeed. There are no moderate or extremist organizations. The Syrian government will counter any organization that targets the Syrian people and would try to disintegrate its territorial integrity. We respond to the US according to the events on the ground. The US opposes some terrorist organizations in Syria. But arming groups by the US government is not a new thing. Even the Saudis have armed groups in the past. The Syrian government rejects this totally. We don’t see the $500 million aid and training as something new. We reject it and, if deemed necessary, we will respond to it.

Rudaw: Have the Syrian government troops launched attacks on the IS?

Ali Haidar: The Syrian army and its air force and artillery have constantly attacked the terrorists -- including the IS in both Raqqa and Idlib -- even before the start of the coalition attacks. The Israeli and the Turkish governments have shot downed two of our aircraft so far. Our aircraft were targeted while on missions against the terrorists.

Rudaw: What do you think the events will lead to?

Ali Haidar: All options are on the table. There is a possibility that the coalition widens and both Iran and Russia will join the efforts in coordination with both Syria and Iraq.

Rudaw: How do you see the Western support for the Kurdish Peshmarga troops? Would you like to see a similar support for the Syrian Kurds?

Ali Haidar: I do not differentiate between citizens in north or south of Syria. I believe that their rights -- or parts of their rights -- should be realized. One such right is to be able to live in peace and harmony in their own country. So, we do support any side that would support that. This is primarily the commitment of the Syrian government -- rather than the duty of any other power -- to arm them. We should provide them with all the necessary equipment to repel the terrorists. We support all cooperation that empowers the resistance, but within the framework of our national aspirations. And in regard to the Peshmarga forces, since the support enables them to defend their land and people, we see it as natural and support it. But the sovereignty of both Iraq and Syria should be respected. We support any efforts that strengthens national sovereignty.

http://rudaw.net/english/interview/29092014

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Fox News

IS controls 325 villages around Syrian Kurds' stronghold

The Islamic State militia remains in control of at least 325 villages around Kobani, the stronghold of Syria's embattled Kurds, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Tuesday.

Two weeks after IS began its advance on the strategic town, the jihadists has gained control of defensive lines of Kurdish militias east, south and west of Kobani, which is located on the Turkish-Syrian border, according to the London-based observatory.

The observatory reported earlier that IS was advancing from the east and had come within 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) of the city, expressing fears that a massacre of Kurds would follow the fall of Kobani, even though 200,000 people have already fled the city.

The observatory said that 800 Syrian Kurds have gone missing and are presumed dead, though their deaths are still unconfirmed. It also said that IS has released 70 Kurdish students it abducted in May.

Their release comes after days of bombing by the international coalition of the village of Manbij, near Aleppo, where the students were believed to be held. EFE

http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2 ... tronghold/

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Mother Jones

An Aid Worker Tweeted the Location of an ISIS Camp. Now They're Hunting for Him.

Last Friday, Oscar Bergamin, a Swiss humanitarian aid worker helping refugees in northern Syria, wrote a tweet that included 18 digits. They were the coordinates of a bunker near the Turkey-Syria border that had been seized by members of ISIS, the self-proclaimed Islamic State that's terrorizing large chunks of Iraq and Syria. The tweet caught the eye of ISIS-affiliated accounts on Twitter, which sent out a barrage of threatening messages to Bergamin, warning that they were "coming for Mr. Aid Worker," and that he would be beheaded. (Two weeks ago, ISIS beheaded British aid worker David Haines and holds another British aid worker, Alan Henning, hostage.)

Bergamin, the president of a Swiss humanitarian aid organization called Ash-Sham CARE, says that the bunker he tweeted about is "no secret at all" and can be seen from miles away. He says he intentionally shared the bunker's location so that the US military might destroy it.

The day before he tweeted the coordinates, Bergamin was perched outside the bunker, taking photos and watching out for civilians. On Twitter, he asked the US Central Command and "all followers" to "just blow it away!" Bergamin tells Mother Jones that a "fit of cynicism" prompted his messages. With as many as 18,000 refugee families are trapped just beyond the bunker, he felt helpless and angry at ISIS.



After his tweets, Bergamin received death threats over Twitter in clear, direct English, forcing him to make his account private. Some ISIS accounts have tweeted pictures of his LinkedIn and Twitter accounts and pictures of him, claiming that Bergamin is a CIA agent who needs to be killed. Bergamin is not disclosing his current whereabouts for his own safety.

Following Bergamin's tweet and the ongoing US air offensive against the Islamic State, Twitter accounts connected to the group have issued a media blackout and have clammed up about its movements and locations.

Bergamin founded Ash-Sham CARE in November of 2011 along with "a group of concerned people especially worried about the appalling humanitarian situation in Syria." The group focuses on providing emergency humanitarian assistance, primarily in northern Syria. According to Bergamin, the group is "largely unnoticed by the public" and receives little funding. Though its team is small, he says it has built an excellent network throughout Syria.

Located at the Turkish border on the eastern side of the Euphrates River, the bunker was held by the Free Syrian Army before ISIS. Bergamin says that "there are almost every day clashes there between Kurds and ISIS" near the bunker and that the area has been basically unreachable since ISIS took the town of Jarabalus and massacred many civilians in January. Prior to the siege, Bergamin's organization provided aid to five camps for internally displaced persons in the city. The bunker currently blocks the way to the camps.

Bergamin now admits that the tweets may not have been a good idea, and that his anger and frustration may have gotten the better of him. Humanitarian groups tend to remain neutral in war zones; the International Red Cross's fundamental principles of humanitarian work include impartiality and neutrality.

Other Twitter users have questioned Bergamin, telling him that he has put lives at danger by provoking ISIS. "Giorgio" wrote to Bergamin, "your tweet is being used by IS affiliates on twitter to prove that aid workers aren't peaceful people, hence can be hit," to which Bergamin replied, "Unfortunately."

Bergamin notes that while he gave ISIS an opportunity to lash out at aid workers and journalists, the coordinates of the bunker are not especially secret at all: He pulled its location from Wikimapia. "Reactions show ISIS has been waiting for something like this," he writes in an email. "I am neither a spy or working for CIA. It's as if I send the secret coordinates of the Eiffel Tower in Paris…it's ridiculous."

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/201 ... isis-tweet

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Kobani expected to be overrun soon

Latest news updates - not always reliable

#OBAMAhearKOBANI

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BBC News Middle East

Islamic State crisis: New strikes in Syria near Kobane



US-led forces have carried out air strikes on Islamic State (IS) militants battling Kurdish fighters around the northern Syrian border town of Kobane.

A BBC correspondent saw explosions outside the town in the morning.

At least 10 people were killed overnight, Syrian activists said, as the jihadists moved to within 2 to 3km (1.2-1.9 miles) of Kobane.

Tens of thousands of people have fled across the border into Turkey since IS launched an offensive two weeks ago.

The jihadists' advance has put pressure on the Turkish government to take a more significant role in the US-led coalition formed to combat IS.

Ministers submitted a proposal to parliament late on Tuesday to allow Turkish troops to conduct operations in Syria and Iraq, and to allow foreign forces to use Turkish military bases.


Turkish tanks have taken up positions along the Syrian border near Kobane

Parliament is expected to debate the proposal on Thursday, and the ruling AK Party's majority means it is likely to be approved.

In a separate development in Syria on Wednesday, at least 17 people, including several children, were killed and dozens wounded in a double bomb attack in the central city of Homs, officials and activists said.

The blasts took place as children left a school in the Akrama al-Jadida district, which is dominated by President Bashar al-Assad's Alawite sect.

Desperate civilians

The BBC's Paul Adams, who is on the Turkish side of the border near Kobane, reported sporadic fighting between Syrian Kurdish and IS fighters on Wednesday morning. Several mortars were fired by the jihadists at houses on the besieged town's outskirts.

There were reports of several air strikes overnight and our correspondent says he saw at least two more on positions in the distance, each one sending a huge column of black smoke high into the sky. Jets are continuing to circle overhead, he adds.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based activist group that monitors casualties from the three-year-old conflict in Syria, reported that there had been at least five air strikes south and south-east of Kobane.

It said nine Kurdish militiamen from the Popular Protection Units (YPG) and an IS militant had been killed in clashes overnight.

Full Article:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-29442039

[Anthea]

Why do not the lovely kind (I am trying hard not to swear)

Turkish goverment send their tanks across the border to protect the Kurds ?

[Anthea]

Al Jazeera

Children killed in Homs double blasts

Double bombing outside primary school in the central Syrian city kills at least 22 people, including 10 children.

At least 10 children are among 22 people killed in a twin bombings outside a primary school in the government-controlled city of Homs in central Syria.

A Syrian pro-government channel broadcast on Wednesday brief footage of the aftermath, showing parents looking for their children and schoolbags and bloodstains on the ground. Flames rose from a car nearby.

Homs governor Talal Barazzi described the attack as a "terrorist act and a desperate attempt that targeted school children".

The blasts happened as children were leaving the Ekremah al-Makhzoumi primary school, said an official with the Homs governorate who refused to be named.

The first explosion was from a car bomb parked and detonated in front of the school, followed minutes later by a suicide bomber who drove by and detonated his explosives-laden car, said the anonymous official.

It was one of the deadliest attacks in Homs in months. At least 56 more people were wounded in the incident, the official said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Wednesday's attack, but Syrian rebels fighting to oust Assad have carried out such bombings during the country's civil war.

There have been horrific attacks against civilians by all sides throughout the brutal conflict, now in its fourth year, but rarely have children appeared to be the direct target.

In May, Syrian government forces dropped a bomb in the northern city of Aleppo, hitting a complex that held a school alongside a rebel compound.

At least 19 people, including 10 children were killed in that attack.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeas ... 80724.html

[Anthea]

People in Kobani are appealing for America to evacuate the women and children

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Bloomberg

Islamic State Nears Kurdish Town as Turk Lawmakers Debate Troops
By Selcan Hacaoglu

Islamic State forces are closing in on the Syrian town of Kobani, a key Kurdish stronghold near the border with Turkey, as Turkish lawmakers prepare to authorize the army to send troops to the neighboring country.

Militants driving tanks and firing mortars captured the final village on the outskirts of Kobani and were one kilometer from the town’s entrance, according to Ibrahim Ayhan, a lawmaker from the pro-Kurdish People’s Democracy Party. Airstrikes yesterday failed to slow their advance, he said by phone. The U.S military said there were three strikes near Kobani, which destroyed an armed vehicle, artillery piece, and tank.

The militants have besieged Kobani for more than two weeks, forcing an exodus of northern Syria’s ethnic Kurdish population into Turkey. The Turkish military has sent tanks and troops to the border in response, and is urging the creation of a buffer zone inside Syria.

Turkey is seeking parliamentary approval for possible military action in Syria and Iraq that would allow its own forces to target Islamic State and permit foreign troops to use Turkish soil. A bill authorizing such measures is due for debate today, though its passage won’t necessarily mean that Turkey will take action.

Islamic State fighters now control 325 villages and towns around Kobani, said the U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which documents the Syrian war through a network of witnesses.

Kobani was rocked by explosions yesterday, with black smoke billowing across the town’s white stone buildings, CNN-Turk television showed. As Ayhan spoke on the phone, another explosion ripped through the area.

‘Superior Firepower’

Syrian Kurdish militias known as the People’s Protection Units, or YPG, are resisting with AK-47 Kalashnikov automatic rifles and heavy machine guns against the “superior firepower” of Islamic State, said Ayhan. He said he saw YPG fighters fortifying their positions in the town with sandbags as they prepared for house-
to-house combat.

Joining the coalition assembled by the U.S. to fight Islamic State would mark a change of course for Turkey, which earlier showed reluctance to get involved in the conflict. Turkey “can’t stay out” of the campaign, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Sept. 28.

School Bombing

Erdogan has called for a “secure zone” along the Syrian border to shelter refugees and against threats emanating from Syria. Kurds in Turkey have voiced suspicions that Erdogan wants to create a militarized buffer zone in order to smother the autonomous Kurdish region in Syria.

The Syrian conflict, which began in March 2011, has left more than 190,000 people dead as it escalated from peaceful protests into a war fought mostly across the country’s sectarian divisions.

Two blasts near a school in the central province of Homs yesterday left 39 people dead, including 30 children who were mostly under the age of 12, the Syrian Observatory said. The area where the attack took place is dominated by Alawites, the Shiite offshoot sect to which President Bashar al-Assad belongs.

To contact the reporter on this story: Selcan Hacaoglu in Ankara at shacaoglu@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alaa Shahine at asalha@bloomberg.net Jack Fairweather, Ben Holland

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-10-0 ... -says.html

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BBC News Middle East

Refugees on Syria-Turkey border watch as homes are bombed

Tens of thousands of Kurdish refugees have passed through the border towns and villages between Syria and Turkey in recent weeks.

The push by Islamic State to capture more territory and air-strikes by the US-led coalition have driven many to flee their homes.

Government and international agencies have been overwhelmed by the number of displaced people, leaving many refugees to fall back on help from family, friends or complete strangers.

Rengin Arslan reports from Suruc, on the border between Turkey and Syria.

Link to Video:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-29455377

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Reuters

Islamic State presses assault on Syrian border town, Kurds warn Turkey
By Ayla Jean Yackley and Alexander Dziadosz (Additional reporting by Daren Butler in Istanbul,
Stephen Brown in Berlin, Rahim Salman and Yara Bayoumy in Baghdad, Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva
and Fiona Ortiz in Chicago; Writing by Nick Tattersall; editing by Anna Willard and Giles Elgood)

Islamic State insurgents tightened their grip on a Syrian border town on Thursday despite coalition air strikes, sending thousands more Kurdish refugees into Turkey and dragging Ankara deeper into the conflict.

Kurdish militants warned that peace talks with the Turkish state would come to an end if the Islamist insurgents were allowed to carry out a massacre in the predominantly Kurdish town of Kobani, pressuring Ankara to act.

Islamic State fighters advanced to within a few kilometres of the town on three sides, after taking control of hundreds of villages around Kobani in recent weeks.

In neighbouring Iraq, the insurgents have carried out mass executions, abducted women and girls as sex slaves, and used children as fighters in systematic violations that may amount to war crimes, the United Nations said.

They took control of most of the western Iraqi town of Hit early on Thursday in Anbar province, where they already control many surrounding towns, launching the assault with three suicide car bombs at its eastern entrance.

U.S. led forces, which have been bombing Islamic State targets in Syria since last week as well as in Iraq, hit a village near Kobani on Wednesday and strikes were reported further south overnight, according to sources in the town, which is known as Ayn al-Arab in Arabic.

But they seemed to do little to stop the Islamists' advance.

"We left because we realised it was only going to get worse," said Leyla, a 37-year-old Syrian arriving at the Yumurtalik border crossing with her six children after waiting 10 days in a field, hoping the clashes would subside.

"We will go back tomorrow if Islamic State leaves. I don't want to be here," she said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors Syria's war, said Islamic State militants were clashing with Kurdish fighters hundreds of metres from Kobani, raising fears they would enter the town "at any moment".

It said it had confirmed the deaths of 16 Islamic State fighters and seven Kurdish militants in the violence but that the true toll was likely higher.

About 20 explosions were heard in the areas of the Tishrin dam and town of Manbij 50 km (30 miles) south of Kobani overnight, resulting from missile strikes believed to be carried out by the coalition, the Observatory said earlier.

Asya Abdullah, a senior official in Syria's dominant Kurdish political party the Democratic Union Party (PYD), said there were clashes to the east, west and south of Kobani and that Islamic State had advanced to within 2-3 km on all fronts.

"If they want to prevent a massacre (the coalition) must act much more comprehensively," she told Reuters by phone from Kobani, adding that air strikes elsewhere in Syria had pushed Islamic State fighters towards the border town.

"We've been fighting ISIS with all our strength for 18 days to save Kobani. We will continue the resistance... It's civilians who will die if Kobani falls. But we will protect them."

PRESSURE ON TURKEY

Turkey's parliament will vote later on a motion which would allow the government to authorise cross-border military incursions against Islamic State fighters in Syria and Iraq, and allow coalition forces to use Turkish territory.

The Turkish army vowed to defend the tomb of Suleyman Shah, grandfather of the founder of the Ottoman Empire, in a Turkish enclave in northern Syria, telling its troops there that it would rush to their defence if needed.

"One call and we will immediately be at your side," Chief of the General Staff General Necdet Ozel said in a statement.

But President Tayyip Erdogan insists U.S.-led air strikes alone will not contain the Islamic State threat and is calling for the removal of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, an aim not shared by the U.S.-led military coalition.

Turkey accuses Assad of stoking the growth of Islamic State through sectarian policies and believes the stability on its 900 km (560 mile) border will only deepen if he clings to power.

It is also reluctant to take action that may strengthen Kurdish fighters allied to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a militant group that has fought the Turkish state for three decades and with which it is conducting fragile peace talks.

"If this massacre attempt achieves its goal it will end the process (with Turkey)," PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan said in a statement released by a pro-Kurdish party delegation which visited him on Wednesday in his island prison near Istanbul.

"I urge everyone in Turkey who does not want the process and the democracy voyage to collapse to take responsibility in Kobani," he said in the statement.

Kurdish forces allied to the PKK, the People's Defence Units (YPG), are fighting against the Islamic State insurgents attacking Kobani. The PKK is designated a terrorist group by Turkey, the United States and European Union.

A spokesman for the YPG said a U.S. citizen, Jordan Matson, had joined Kurdish forces in their fight in Syria.

"EXISTENTIAL THREAT" TO TURKEY

Islamic State has carved out swathes of eastern Syria and western Iraq in a drive to create a cross-border caliphate between the Euphrates and the Tigris rivers, terrifying communities into submission by slaughtering those who resist.

Iraqi Kurdish troops drove Islamic State fighters from a strategic border crossing with Syria on Tuesday and won the support of members of a major Sunni tribe, in one of the biggest successes since U.S. forces began bombing the Islamists.

The United States has been carrying out strikes in Iraq against the militant group since July and in Syria since last week with the help of Arab allies. Britain and France have also struck Islamic State targets in Iraq.

But Islamic State fighters on the border with Turkey, which hosts a U.S. air base at its southern town of Incirlik not so far used in the air strikes, have yet to be dislodged.

"(Islamic State) is Turkey's greatest existential threat since 1946, when Joseph Stalin demanded that Ankara cede control of the Bosphorus and other territory to the Soviet Union," said Soner Cagaptay, director of the Turkish Research Program at The Washington Institute.

"Erdogan and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu know that only the United States has the necessary military hardware and intelligence assets to defeat ISIS in the long term," he said, forecasting that while Turkey would offer logistics and intelligence support, it was unlikely to wholeheartedly back a military strategy that does not target Assad.

Erdogan said on Wednesday that Turkey's priority was also to enable the 1.5 million refugees it has taken in from Syria's conflict to return home. He has been pushing for a no-fly zone enforced by the U.S.-led coalition to protect a safe haven on the Syrian side of the border where refugees could be sheltered, an idea that has yet to gain traction in Washington.

More than 150,000 refugees have fled Kobani over the past two weeks alone, with a steady exodus continuing. Officials from Turkey's AFAD disaster management agency said 4,000 crossed on Wednesday, and a similar figure the day before.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/ ... RL20141002

[Anthea]

Reuters

Syria Kurds say American joins fight against Islamic State
By Tom Perry and Fiona Ortiz

A U.S. citizen has joined Kurdish forces fighting against Islamic State militants in northern Syria, a spokesman for the main Kurdish armed group in the country said on Thursday.

The Kurdish official said that Jordan Matson had joined the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG), who are mainly battling advances by Islamic State close to Syria's borders with Turkey and Iraq.

"Yes it is true," YPG spokesman Redur Xelil said in an online message. "He is fighting in the Jazaa area."

Jazaa is a town in Syria's northeastern Hasaka province, close to the Iraqi border and has been the site of heavy fighting between the two groups.

The YPG said last month it has lost 35 of its fighters in a two-week battle for control of Jazaa and said Kurdish forces had killed hundreds of Islamic State fighters.

On Thursday Islamic State tightened its grip on a town further west, close to the border with Turkey despite coalition air strikes meant to weaken the group. The fighting has sent tens of thousands of refugees into Turkey since last month.

Xelil, who said he had met Matson, sent a link to online photos on a Kurdish news agency which he said were of the American.

They show a smiling young man in an army shirt with a white and black scarf wrapped around his head. Xelil declined to give further details.

A Facebook page for Jordan Matson says he attended Case High School in Racine, Wisconsin. Reports on social media have said he is 28 years old.

A friend of Matson's said he told online gaming friends about two months ago that he was joining a "private army" to fight Islamic State.

"He told us in the community that he was getting hired by a private army and he let us know two to three months in advance," said Miguel Caron by telephone from Montreal.

"He sent me a personal Facebook message on the 16th of September saying 'hey boss, I'm heading to Syria.' He told me he dropped his girlfriend and stopped looking for a job," Caron added.

Caron, who works for a video and online game company, said he had met Matson at a trade show and that Matson had said he was formerly in the military.

Caron said Matson had posted on Facebook this week that he was in Syria and had been wounded in fighting, but not seriously. The Facebook post has been disseminated via Twitter messages, but is only visible to Matson's friends on his Facebook page.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/ ... GK20141002

[Anthea]

ABC News

Turkey Approves Military Operations in Iraq, Syria

Turkey's parliament gave the government new powers Thursday to launch military incursions into Syria and Iraq, and to allow foreign forces to use its territory for possible operations against the Islamic State group.

The move opens the way for Turkey, a NATO member with a large and modern military, to play a more robust role in the U.S-led coalition against the Sunni militants. However, Turkey has yet to define what that role might be.

The vote came as the extremists pressed their offensive against a beleaguered Kurdish town along Syria's border with Turkey. The assault, which has forced some 160,000 Syrians to flee across the frontier in recent days, left the Kurdish militiamen scrambling to repel the militants' advance into the outskirts of Kobani, also known as Ayn Arab.

The assault came despite renewed U.S.-led airstrikes in the area overnight. The United States has been bombing the Islamic State group across Syria since last week and in neighboring Iraq since early August.

Turkey's parliament had previously approved operations into Iraq and Syria to attack Kurdish separatists or to thwart threats from the Syrian regime. Thursday's motion, which passed 298-98, expands those powers to address threats from the Islamic State militants who control a large cross-border swath of Iraq and Syria, in some cases right up to the Turkish border.

Asked what measures Turkey would take after the motion was approved, Defense Minister Ismet Yilmaz said: "Don't expect any immediate steps."

"The motion prepares the legal ground for possible interventions, but it is too early to say what those interventions will be," said Dogu Ergil, a professor of political science and a columnist for Today's Zaman newspaper.

The motion could allow Iraqi Kurdish fighters to use Turkey's territory to safely cross into Syria to help Syrian Kurdish forces there, or permit the deployment of coalition forces' drones, Ergil said.

Turkey could also allow its air base in Incirlik, some 160 kilometers (100 miles) from the Syrian border to be used by allied planes or for logistics.

In Washington, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki welcomed the Turkish move and said the U.S. was looking forward to strengthening cooperation between Turkey and the rest of the global coalition seeking to defeat the Islamic State group. She declined to say what specific assistance Turkey might be asked to contribute, saying officials were "now discussing what particular role they may play."

The U.S. envoy tasked with coordinating the global coalition, retired Marine Gen. John Allen, was to meet with officials in Turkey over the next week, Psaki said.

Two opposition parties voted against the motion, which comes less than a year before parliamentary elections — a time when the Turkish government is unlikely to take bold military action — and provoked a lively debate among lawmakers.

"Will you be sending the (ground) troops which Obama did not want to send?" opposition legislator Osman Koruturk asked during the debate.

In Syria, Ismet Sheikh Hasan, a senior fighter, said the Kurdish forces were preparing for urban clashes in Kobani in a desperate attempt to repel the militants.

"We are preparing ourselves for street battles," Hasan said. "They still haven't entered Kobani, but we are preparing ourselves."

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wir ... s-25909804

[Anthea]

Does this mean instead of the Turkish army sitting in their tanks happily watching Kobani being destroyed - and it's inhabitants being slaughtered - they are going to drive over the border and help to prevent the lose of any more innocent lives ?