The Economist
Unintended consequences
Are American-led air strikes creating a Sunni backlash?
WHEN America extended the war against the jihadists of Islamic State (IS) to Syria on September 22nd, it seemed to have a strategy: maximise Sunni support to isolate and ultimately defeat the extremists. America would not co-operate with the regime of Bashar Assad. Instead it would build up moderate rebels to the point where, with American help, they could take on both IS and, eventually, Mr Assad’s forces. Five Sunni Arab states joined the air campaign in Syria, where Western friends declined to go. Across the border in Iraq, a new prime minister was installed with the promise to work harder to win over disgruntled Sunnis
The first fortnight of operations has proven messy, however. Though IS has been pushed back in some areas, it is still making advances in others. It has crept towards Baghdad, causing jitters in the city, and this week was close to winning the Syrian Kurdish enclave of Ain al-Arab (known to Kurds as Kobane) on the Turkish border. More worrying for America, hardly anyone in Syria is cheering. Some complain that, instead of bombing Mr Assad, America is attacking his enemies; others claim that it is hitting civilians rather than IS; still others spread the idea that the whole business is a war against Islam. Almost all the rebels—including groups such as Harakat Hazm that receive anti-tank weapons from America and its allies—have criticised America. This raises a troubling question: is America causing a backlash among the very people it needs to win over?
One cause of Syrian disquiet is that, as well as bombing IS, America also targeted Jabhat al-Nusra, one of the strongest groups fighting the Assad regime. America says it only bombed a faction, dubbed the “Khorasan group”, claiming it was planning imminent attacks on the West. Jabhat al-Nusra, is affiliated to al-Qaeda but is nevertheless accepted by more moderate groups for its fighting prowess. IS, by contrast, initially fought rebels and Kurds to carve out territory for its “caliphate”.
The danger is that, out of jihadist solidarity, Jabhat al-Nusra may now join forces with IS to confront the common American enemy. The two fell out in 2013. But since the air strikes they are said to have declared a truce. Both are trying to rally fighters and civilians to their cause— and against America and its allies—by portraying the bombing as a war against Islam. Their international reach is probably limited, but their call for revenge may inspire others. On September 24th Jund al-Khilafah, an Algerian jihadist offshoot that has pledged allegiance to IS, kidnapped and beheaded a 55-year-old French tourist.
There is a second, perhaps more corrosive impact on Syria as a whole. Many note that Mr Assad’s regime has killed many more people than IS, yet Syrian forces have not been touched by American bombs. “Assad kills tens of Syrians every day,” says a father of four from Aleppo province, pulling out his smartphone to show a picture of a dusty, bloody, dead child pulled from the rubble after a regime airstrike. “America spent three years rejecting our calls for weapons and a no-fly zone, but now won’t help us directly.” Syrians, he says, want help to fight on their own, rather than to rely on foreigners’ air strikes.
Mainstream rebels complain that America has not co-ordinated its attacks with them. No bombs hit IS in eastern Aleppo, where its fighters threaten the rebel-held town of Marea, notes Hussam al-Marie, a spokesperson for moderate fighters. And the American plan to train at least 5,000 Syrian rebels has yet to get under way. No group has yet been asked to nominate personnel for training. “When we ask about this, we get more promises,” says a rebel who deals with the Americans. “We have heard a lot of them before.”
America stands accused of compounding the agony of Syria’s civilians. Although its bombs are precision-guided, it faces allegations that its strikes have killed non-combatants. It has acknowledged that its rules to avoid civilian casualties are looser in Syria than those for drone strikes elsewhere. A grain silo was reported hit in the town of Manbij where, military officials say, IS had a logistics hub. The bombing of oil refineries may deny jihadists an important source of revenue, but it has driven up fuel prices in much of Syria.
Rumours are rife that Mr Assad’s air force has bombed civilian areas close to military targets struck by America, creating confusion over who should be blamed. In any case, many Syrians think air strikes are not seriously hurting IS, which had already moved its men and equipment out of some of its bases before they were struck. “They’re like mosquito bites,” says a Syrian living in the Turkish city of Antakya.
Thankfully, from America’s perspective, few Syrian Sunnis regard IS as a desirable ally. And Syria’s sectarian divide is less deep than Iraq’s, so it should be easier to persuade Sunnis to work with other sects. In Iraq, by contrast, military intervention to help the Iraqi government, and to stop IS massacring Yazidis, an esoteric sect, means that America is often seen by Sunnis as the air force of the Shia and minorities. Despite the appointment of Haider al-Abadi to replace the discredited Nuri al-Maliki as Iraq’s prime minister, it is proving hard to prise Sunni tribes and former Baathists from the arms of jihadists who offer protection from, and a challenge to, Shia power. A recent Iraqi opinion poll found a gulf of perceptions between Iraqi Shias and Sunnis: whereas most Shias trusted the Iraqi army, Sunnis were overwhelmingly suspicious of it.
Anti-American griping by rebel groups may be intended to fend off accusations of being America’s pawns; in private, many rebels say they are “not unhappy” to see Jabhat al-Nusra hit; and many civilians dislike IS’s brand of extremism. To some analysts, there may be benefits in forcing zealous Islamists straddling the murky ground between extremists and moderates to decide where they stand. America and its allies could then train and arm moderate fighters with less fear that they will co-operate with jihadists. Yet the complaints carry a warning, too: unless America can convince the majority of Syrians that it is on their side, the biggest winners may be IS and Mr Assad. That was not the plan.
http://www.economist.com/news/middle-ea ... nsequences
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ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Thu Oct 02, 2014 11:18 pm
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Fri Oct 03, 2014 9:34 am
Bloomberg
Islamic State Tanks Near Kobani Drive Kurds Across Turkey Border
Islamic State militants pursued their offensive around Kobani today, threatening to drive thousands more from their homes and deprive the Kurds of one of their few remaining strongholds in Syria.
Kurdish politicians reported from outside the city that there was smoke and the sound of gunfire as Islamic extremists fired toward Kobani. The plumes seen from Turkey were rising from a bus that was hit on the road from Kobani to Aleppo, Ibrahim Kurdo, head of the foreign relations committee in the Kobani region, said by telephone today from the city. He said there was no shelling into the center of Kobani.
“An hour ago we could hear the sound of clashes with mortars and heavy artillery,” he said. At the moment, “we don’t hear anything,” he said.
Islamic State militants have been trying to capture Kobani for nearly three weeks as Kurdish forces struggle to stop its advance from the east, south and west, according to Kurdish officials. Imprisoned Kurdish rebel chief Abdullah Ocalan said yesterday that if Kobani falls, the peace process with Kurds within Turkey would collapse.
Hundreds of civilians are crossing into Turkey after the attacks, said Faysal Sariyildiz, a Kurdish lawmaker from the People’s Democracy Party. Kurdish forces reinforced positions in the east of the city to repel Islamic State.
“Islamic State is not immediately expected to attempt to storm the city,” said Sariyildiz. ‘They are trying to scare civilians and force them flee first.’’
Seeing Smoke
Sariyildiz said earlier that he could see shelling from his vantage point in the village of Atmaniki, which lies to the east of the border crossing of Mursitpinar. That supported an account by Ismail Kaplan, another local Kurdish politician, who spoke from the Turkish town of Suruc across the border.
“They are firing tanks and guns toward the city,” Kaplan said by telephone. “Clashes are taking place just outside the city limits and they are firing into the town. We can hear big booms and see smoke billowing from buildings.”
The U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the Syria war through a network of witnesses, also said the city of Kobani wasn’t hit today.
Fierce clashes were ongoing between Kurdish fighters and Islamic State militants outside the town, Rami Abdurrahman, head of the observatory, said. Kurdish fighters destroyed two armored vehicles belonging to Islamic State, he said.
To contact the reporters on this story: Selcan Hacaoglu in Ankara at shacaoglu@bloomberg.net; Donna Abu-Nasr in Dubai at dabunasr@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alaa Shahine at asalha@bloomberg.net Rodney Jefferson
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2014-1 ... icials-say
Islamic State Tanks Near Kobani Drive Kurds Across Turkey Border
Islamic State militants pursued their offensive around Kobani today, threatening to drive thousands more from their homes and deprive the Kurds of one of their few remaining strongholds in Syria.
Kurdish politicians reported from outside the city that there was smoke and the sound of gunfire as Islamic extremists fired toward Kobani. The plumes seen from Turkey were rising from a bus that was hit on the road from Kobani to Aleppo, Ibrahim Kurdo, head of the foreign relations committee in the Kobani region, said by telephone today from the city. He said there was no shelling into the center of Kobani.
“An hour ago we could hear the sound of clashes with mortars and heavy artillery,” he said. At the moment, “we don’t hear anything,” he said.
Islamic State militants have been trying to capture Kobani for nearly three weeks as Kurdish forces struggle to stop its advance from the east, south and west, according to Kurdish officials. Imprisoned Kurdish rebel chief Abdullah Ocalan said yesterday that if Kobani falls, the peace process with Kurds within Turkey would collapse.
Hundreds of civilians are crossing into Turkey after the attacks, said Faysal Sariyildiz, a Kurdish lawmaker from the People’s Democracy Party. Kurdish forces reinforced positions in the east of the city to repel Islamic State.
“Islamic State is not immediately expected to attempt to storm the city,” said Sariyildiz. ‘They are trying to scare civilians and force them flee first.’’
Seeing Smoke
Sariyildiz said earlier that he could see shelling from his vantage point in the village of Atmaniki, which lies to the east of the border crossing of Mursitpinar. That supported an account by Ismail Kaplan, another local Kurdish politician, who spoke from the Turkish town of Suruc across the border.
“They are firing tanks and guns toward the city,” Kaplan said by telephone. “Clashes are taking place just outside the city limits and they are firing into the town. We can hear big booms and see smoke billowing from buildings.”
The U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the Syria war through a network of witnesses, also said the city of Kobani wasn’t hit today.
Fierce clashes were ongoing between Kurdish fighters and Islamic State militants outside the town, Rami Abdurrahman, head of the observatory, said. Kurdish fighters destroyed two armored vehicles belonging to Islamic State, he said.
To contact the reporters on this story: Selcan Hacaoglu in Ankara at shacaoglu@bloomberg.net; Donna Abu-Nasr in Dubai at dabunasr@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alaa Shahine at asalha@bloomberg.net Rodney Jefferson
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2014-1 ... icials-say
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Fri Oct 03, 2014 9:41 am
The Guardian
Isis threat to Kobani: Turkey’s prime minister vows to stop militants
The Turkish prime minister has said the country will do “whatever we can” to stop the Syrian Kurdish border town of Kobani falling to Islamic State (Isis) as MPs voted to authorise military action against the militants.
Ahmet Davutoğlu spoke hours after the vote in the Turkish parliament, which authorises cross-border raids and allows coalition forces to launch operations from Turkish territory, as Isis fighters were within a few miles of the town centre on three sides.
“We wouldn’t want Kobani to fall. We’ll do whatever we can to prevent this from happening,” Davutoğlu said in a discussion with journalists broadcast on the A Haber television channel.
“No other country has the capacity to affect the developments in Syria and Iraq. No other country will be affected like us either,” he said. His comments were in contrast to the Turkish defence minister, Ismet Yilmaz, who earlier said operations should not be expected immediately.
The Isis advance on Kobani, which the group intends to control by the time of the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha on Saturday, has sent more than 150,000 Syrian Kurdish refugees into Turkey.
Local Kurdish fighters have braced for clashes. The BBC, reporting from just across the border, said black Isis flags were visible, while heavy artillery fire and tracer rounds lit the sky around the town.
“Compared with Isis, our weaponry is simple. They have cannons, long-range rockets and tanks,” Idris Nahsen, a Kurdish official in the town, told Agence France-Presse.
The Pentagon said the US-led coalition had conducted at least seven air sorties against Isis around Kobani in the five days to Wednesday, but there were no reports of any strikes on Thursday as the jihadis reportedly came within sight of the city. Syrian human rights activists warned that without urgent intervention to protect the Kurds, the city could fall within hours.
“From the east and south, Isis are about a mile from Kobani. Most civilians have left the city, and any minute Isis will be inside Kobani,” said Rami Abdulrahman, who runs the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. “There are many questions as to why they [the US-led coalition] don’t attack Isis now as they are easy targets. They have 20 tanks and humvees. Without their heavy vehicles, the Kurds would be able to defeat them.”
According to Kurdish activists and media, fighting has approached the outskirts of the city. “We call on everyone not to give up on Kobani,” said one fighter from the People’s Protection Units (YPG) interviewed by Turkish TV channel IMC TV. “If Kobani falls, we will sacrifice 10,000 martyrs in the process. The fall of Kobani would spell the fall of Kurdistan. We will never give up on Kurdistan.”
He warned that the YPG forces in Kobani were struggling: “We have been fighting for 15 days. We destroy their tanks, and their heavy weapons. We don’t have many weapons left. We ask Kurds to support us.”
The Turkish vote came hours after the new UN high commissioner, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, accused Isis of a range of atrocities, including attacks on civilians, executions of captured soldiers, abductions, rapes and the desecration of religious and cultural sites. “The array of violations and abuses perpetrated by Isil [Isis] and associated armed groups is staggering, and many of their acts may amount to war crimes or crimes against humanity,” he said.
The UN report also pointed to abuses by Iraqi security forces and pro-Baghdad militias, including potentially indiscriminate and disproportionate air strikes and shelling. Zeid called on Iraq to sign up to the international criminal court so that it would have the jurisdiction to investigate the “horrendous situation” in the country.
Denmark’s parliament also voted on Thursday to join the coalition against Isis. In a vote of 94 to nine, with many abstentions, the parliament approved four warplanes and three reserve jets to be deployed to northern Iraq. “It was a correct decision, but also a difficult one,” the Danish prime minister, Helle Thorning-Schmidt, said.
Ankara had previously rejected military action against Isis in either Syria or Iraq, until a surprise U-turn when the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, pledged his “full support” for the US-led military coalition and their fight against Isis, but tied his promise to certain conditions.
Addressing parliament on Wednesday, Erdoğan said air strikes alone would not defeat Isis but Turkey would not stage ground operations without an internationally enforced security and no-fly zone.
“Air strikes will only delay the threat and danger. This has been the case in Iraq so far,” Erdoğan said. “It is inevitable that temporary solutions will cause Iraq to face such interventions every 10 years. Similarly, ignoring Syria will also delay a proper solution.” He also underlined that one of Turkey’s priorities remained the removal of the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, an aim not shared by the US-led military coalition.
Emrullah Işler, an MP for the ruling Justice and Development party (AKP), said the action was necessary because Syria had become “a nest for terror and terrorists”. He said: “Elements affiliated with the Syrian regime are threatening the region. The main [culprit] responsible for the Isis threat is the Syrian regime.”
Thursday’s motion will allow for the establishment of a “security zone” on Syrian soil which, Turkey argues, would enable the creation of a haven for the 1.5 million Syrian refugees in the country.
Rights groups criticised the idea of a security zone as misleading. “A security zone only creates the illusion of security for refugees,” Andrew Gardner, Turkey researcher for Amnesty International, said. “The border regions are the most embattled zones in the war in Syria and nobody can guarantee the safety for refugees there.”
In the past two weeks, the encroachment of Isis insurgents has forced tens of thousands of Syrian Kurds to seek refuge in Turkey. US air strikes have been only partly able to halt the militants’ advance.
Under two separate existing mandates, Turkish troops are already authorised to be deployed across the borders with Iraq and Syria to defend their country against the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK), active in northern Iraq, and against Assad’s forces.
Both authorisations, due to expire this month, would be extended in the combined mandate MPs are voting for on Thursday. The main opposition Republican People’s party (CHP) and the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democracy party (HDP) both vowed to vote against the motion.
The CHP criticised the proposed bill as “too vague”, but others argue that the volatile and fast-changing security situation in the Syrian conflict rendered an “adjustable” phrasing necessary. “We are dealing with state actors, non-state actors and a conflict that is not contained within national borders”, said security expert Nihat Ali Özcan.
Kurdish groups on both sides of the Turkish-Syrian border have repeatedly accused Turkey of supporting Isis against Kurdish fighters. They argue that the authorisation of troop deployment and a buffer zone across the border serves only as a pretext to establish a military presence in quasi-autonomous Kurdish regions that have emerged as a result of the war in Syria.
Abdullah Öcalan, the jailed PKK leader, warned that if there was a massacre of Kurds in Kobani the peace process between the PKK and the Turkish government would halt.
Analysts underlined that the extended legislation did not mean Turkey would actively enter the conflict in Syria.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/o ... -davutoglu
Isis threat to Kobani: Turkey’s prime minister vows to stop militants
The Turkish prime minister has said the country will do “whatever we can” to stop the Syrian Kurdish border town of Kobani falling to Islamic State (Isis) as MPs voted to authorise military action against the militants.
Ahmet Davutoğlu spoke hours after the vote in the Turkish parliament, which authorises cross-border raids and allows coalition forces to launch operations from Turkish territory, as Isis fighters were within a few miles of the town centre on three sides.
“We wouldn’t want Kobani to fall. We’ll do whatever we can to prevent this from happening,” Davutoğlu said in a discussion with journalists broadcast on the A Haber television channel.
“No other country has the capacity to affect the developments in Syria and Iraq. No other country will be affected like us either,” he said. His comments were in contrast to the Turkish defence minister, Ismet Yilmaz, who earlier said operations should not be expected immediately.
The Isis advance on Kobani, which the group intends to control by the time of the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha on Saturday, has sent more than 150,000 Syrian Kurdish refugees into Turkey.
Local Kurdish fighters have braced for clashes. The BBC, reporting from just across the border, said black Isis flags were visible, while heavy artillery fire and tracer rounds lit the sky around the town.
“Compared with Isis, our weaponry is simple. They have cannons, long-range rockets and tanks,” Idris Nahsen, a Kurdish official in the town, told Agence France-Presse.
The Pentagon said the US-led coalition had conducted at least seven air sorties against Isis around Kobani in the five days to Wednesday, but there were no reports of any strikes on Thursday as the jihadis reportedly came within sight of the city. Syrian human rights activists warned that without urgent intervention to protect the Kurds, the city could fall within hours.
“From the east and south, Isis are about a mile from Kobani. Most civilians have left the city, and any minute Isis will be inside Kobani,” said Rami Abdulrahman, who runs the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. “There are many questions as to why they [the US-led coalition] don’t attack Isis now as they are easy targets. They have 20 tanks and humvees. Without their heavy vehicles, the Kurds would be able to defeat them.”
According to Kurdish activists and media, fighting has approached the outskirts of the city. “We call on everyone not to give up on Kobani,” said one fighter from the People’s Protection Units (YPG) interviewed by Turkish TV channel IMC TV. “If Kobani falls, we will sacrifice 10,000 martyrs in the process. The fall of Kobani would spell the fall of Kurdistan. We will never give up on Kurdistan.”
He warned that the YPG forces in Kobani were struggling: “We have been fighting for 15 days. We destroy their tanks, and their heavy weapons. We don’t have many weapons left. We ask Kurds to support us.”
The Turkish vote came hours after the new UN high commissioner, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, accused Isis of a range of atrocities, including attacks on civilians, executions of captured soldiers, abductions, rapes and the desecration of religious and cultural sites. “The array of violations and abuses perpetrated by Isil [Isis] and associated armed groups is staggering, and many of their acts may amount to war crimes or crimes against humanity,” he said.
The UN report also pointed to abuses by Iraqi security forces and pro-Baghdad militias, including potentially indiscriminate and disproportionate air strikes and shelling. Zeid called on Iraq to sign up to the international criminal court so that it would have the jurisdiction to investigate the “horrendous situation” in the country.
Denmark’s parliament also voted on Thursday to join the coalition against Isis. In a vote of 94 to nine, with many abstentions, the parliament approved four warplanes and three reserve jets to be deployed to northern Iraq. “It was a correct decision, but also a difficult one,” the Danish prime minister, Helle Thorning-Schmidt, said.
Ankara had previously rejected military action against Isis in either Syria or Iraq, until a surprise U-turn when the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, pledged his “full support” for the US-led military coalition and their fight against Isis, but tied his promise to certain conditions.
Addressing parliament on Wednesday, Erdoğan said air strikes alone would not defeat Isis but Turkey would not stage ground operations without an internationally enforced security and no-fly zone.
“Air strikes will only delay the threat and danger. This has been the case in Iraq so far,” Erdoğan said. “It is inevitable that temporary solutions will cause Iraq to face such interventions every 10 years. Similarly, ignoring Syria will also delay a proper solution.” He also underlined that one of Turkey’s priorities remained the removal of the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, an aim not shared by the US-led military coalition.
Emrullah Işler, an MP for the ruling Justice and Development party (AKP), said the action was necessary because Syria had become “a nest for terror and terrorists”. He said: “Elements affiliated with the Syrian regime are threatening the region. The main [culprit] responsible for the Isis threat is the Syrian regime.”
Thursday’s motion will allow for the establishment of a “security zone” on Syrian soil which, Turkey argues, would enable the creation of a haven for the 1.5 million Syrian refugees in the country.
Rights groups criticised the idea of a security zone as misleading. “A security zone only creates the illusion of security for refugees,” Andrew Gardner, Turkey researcher for Amnesty International, said. “The border regions are the most embattled zones in the war in Syria and nobody can guarantee the safety for refugees there.”
In the past two weeks, the encroachment of Isis insurgents has forced tens of thousands of Syrian Kurds to seek refuge in Turkey. US air strikes have been only partly able to halt the militants’ advance.
Under two separate existing mandates, Turkish troops are already authorised to be deployed across the borders with Iraq and Syria to defend their country against the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK), active in northern Iraq, and against Assad’s forces.
Both authorisations, due to expire this month, would be extended in the combined mandate MPs are voting for on Thursday. The main opposition Republican People’s party (CHP) and the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democracy party (HDP) both vowed to vote against the motion.
The CHP criticised the proposed bill as “too vague”, but others argue that the volatile and fast-changing security situation in the Syrian conflict rendered an “adjustable” phrasing necessary. “We are dealing with state actors, non-state actors and a conflict that is not contained within national borders”, said security expert Nihat Ali Özcan.
Kurdish groups on both sides of the Turkish-Syrian border have repeatedly accused Turkey of supporting Isis against Kurdish fighters. They argue that the authorisation of troop deployment and a buffer zone across the border serves only as a pretext to establish a military presence in quasi-autonomous Kurdish regions that have emerged as a result of the war in Syria.
Abdullah Öcalan, the jailed PKK leader, warned that if there was a massacre of Kurds in Kobani the peace process between the PKK and the Turkish government would halt.
Analysts underlined that the extended legislation did not mean Turkey would actively enter the conflict in Syria.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/o ... -davutoglu
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Fri Oct 03, 2014 10:03 am
Reuters
Turkey vows support for besieged Syrian town, but no military pledge
Turkey will do what it can to prevent the predominantly Kurdish town of Kobani, near its border with Syria, falling to Islamic State insurgents, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said late on Thursday, but stopped short of committing to military action.
Hours before Davutoglu's comments, parliament gave the government powers to order cross-border military incursions against Islamic State, and to allow foreign coalition forces to launch similar operations from Turkish territory.
"We wouldn't want Kobani to fall. We'll do whatever we can to prevent this from happening," Davutoglu said in a discussion with journalists broadcast on the A Haber television station, in comments apparently meant to placate Turkey's Kurdish critics.
But later in the two-hour discussion programme, he appeared to pull back from any suggestion that this meant Turkey was planning a military incursion, saying such a move could drag Ankara into a wider conflict along its 900 km (560-mile) border.
"Some are saying 'Why aren't you protecting Kurds in Kobani?' If the Turkish armed forces enter Kobani and the Turkmens from Yayladag ask 'why aren't you saving us?', we would have to go there as well," he said, referring to another ethnic minority in Syria across from a Turkish border town.
"When the Arab citizens across from Reyhanli say 'why don't you save us as well", we'd have to go there too."
Defence Minister Ismet Yilmaz was also quoted as telling reporters that it would be wrong to expect imminent military action after the parliamentary motion passed.
Islamic State fighters advanced to within a few kilometres (miles) of the centre of Kobani on three sides on Thursday, having taken control of hundreds of villages around the town in recent weeks.
More than 180,000 Syrian Kurds have now fled to Turkey to escape the insurgents' assault, Davutoglu said.
Their advance to within clear sight of Turkish military positions on the border has piled pressure on the NATO member to take a more robust stance against the Islamists.
But Ankara remains hesitant, fearing military intervention could deepen the insecurity on its border by strengthening Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and bolster Kurdish fighters linked to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has waged a three-decade insurgency against the Turkish state.
Jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan said on Wednesday that peace talks between his group and the Turkish state will come to an end if Islamic State militants are allowed to carry out a massacre in Kobani.
Davutoglu said it was wrong to link the two issues.
"If Kobani falls, Turkey is not at fault. If Kobani falls, this shouldn't be tied to the solution process (with the PKK). Kurds in Kobani are our brothers as well," Davutoglu said.
"The opportunity the (parliamentary) motion gives us is that we can do everything possible when the situation warrants it ... We will take all humanitarian precautions against the persecution of our brothers in Kobani," he said.
CONFLICTING PRIORITIES
Kurdish politicians voiced doubts that Turkey would intervene in support of Kurdish fighters battling the Islamic State onslaught, viewing the parliament mandate as aimed as much against Assad and the PKK as against the Islamists.
"Such comments are solely aimed at keeping the Kurdish people happy but don't have any material backing," said Ertugrul Kurkcu, a senior official from the pro-Kurdish party HDP. "At the centre of this mandate is the Syrian government and Assad and the PKK, not Islamic State."
The party's co-chairman Selahattin Demirtas met Davutoglu on Wednesday, "but no tangible action plan or promise to help protect Kurds was presented. These are just words of consolation," Kurkcu told Reuters.
Demirtas said Davutoglu needed to back up his promise to help Kobani with action.
"Davutoglu's statement is the first expression of a change of stance by the government. But it has to be put into practice. Even this second it is important for logistical support to be sent to Kobani," he told the Hurriyet daily.
U.S.-led forces have been bombing Islamic State targets in Syria and Iraq, hitting a village near Kobani on Wednesday. Turkey has so far resisted a frontline military role.
President Tayyip Erdogan insists air strikes alone will not contain the Islamic State threat, and wants simultaneous action to be taken against Assad's government, including the creation of a no-fly zone on the Syrian side of the border.
"You know what will happen if there isn't a no-fly zone? ISIL bases will be bombed and then the Syrian regime, Assad, who has committed all those massacres, believing that he is now legitimate, will bide his time and bomb Aleppo," Davutoglu said.
"ISIL withdraws, the Free Syria Army (moderate opposition forces) are weak, and the regime will hit Aleppo with all its might. Three million people will start moving from Aleppo to Turkey," he said.
Thursday's parliamentary vote extended a mandate initially intended to allow Ankara to strike Kurdish militants in northern Iraq and to defend against any threat from Assad's forces.
Those objectives remain in place, complicating its policy towards Islamic State and meaning it is likely to remain reluctant to take a full role in the U.S.-led coalition.
"Turkey's Syria policy is awash with confusing and often conflicting priorities ... (the) policy is to degrade ISIS and Assad alike while also subjugating the PKK," said Soner Cagaptay, director of the Turkish Research Program at The Washington Institute. (Additional reporting by Humeyra Pamuk and Orhan Coskun in Ankara; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Peter Graff)
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/ ... KN20141003
Turkey vows support for besieged Syrian town, but no military pledge
Turkey will do what it can to prevent the predominantly Kurdish town of Kobani, near its border with Syria, falling to Islamic State insurgents, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said late on Thursday, but stopped short of committing to military action.
Hours before Davutoglu's comments, parliament gave the government powers to order cross-border military incursions against Islamic State, and to allow foreign coalition forces to launch similar operations from Turkish territory.
"We wouldn't want Kobani to fall. We'll do whatever we can to prevent this from happening," Davutoglu said in a discussion with journalists broadcast on the A Haber television station, in comments apparently meant to placate Turkey's Kurdish critics.
But later in the two-hour discussion programme, he appeared to pull back from any suggestion that this meant Turkey was planning a military incursion, saying such a move could drag Ankara into a wider conflict along its 900 km (560-mile) border.
"Some are saying 'Why aren't you protecting Kurds in Kobani?' If the Turkish armed forces enter Kobani and the Turkmens from Yayladag ask 'why aren't you saving us?', we would have to go there as well," he said, referring to another ethnic minority in Syria across from a Turkish border town.
"When the Arab citizens across from Reyhanli say 'why don't you save us as well", we'd have to go there too."
Defence Minister Ismet Yilmaz was also quoted as telling reporters that it would be wrong to expect imminent military action after the parliamentary motion passed.
Islamic State fighters advanced to within a few kilometres (miles) of the centre of Kobani on three sides on Thursday, having taken control of hundreds of villages around the town in recent weeks.
More than 180,000 Syrian Kurds have now fled to Turkey to escape the insurgents' assault, Davutoglu said.
Their advance to within clear sight of Turkish military positions on the border has piled pressure on the NATO member to take a more robust stance against the Islamists.
But Ankara remains hesitant, fearing military intervention could deepen the insecurity on its border by strengthening Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and bolster Kurdish fighters linked to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has waged a three-decade insurgency against the Turkish state.
Jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan said on Wednesday that peace talks between his group and the Turkish state will come to an end if Islamic State militants are allowed to carry out a massacre in Kobani.
Davutoglu said it was wrong to link the two issues.
"If Kobani falls, Turkey is not at fault. If Kobani falls, this shouldn't be tied to the solution process (with the PKK). Kurds in Kobani are our brothers as well," Davutoglu said.
"The opportunity the (parliamentary) motion gives us is that we can do everything possible when the situation warrants it ... We will take all humanitarian precautions against the persecution of our brothers in Kobani," he said.
CONFLICTING PRIORITIES
Kurdish politicians voiced doubts that Turkey would intervene in support of Kurdish fighters battling the Islamic State onslaught, viewing the parliament mandate as aimed as much against Assad and the PKK as against the Islamists.
"Such comments are solely aimed at keeping the Kurdish people happy but don't have any material backing," said Ertugrul Kurkcu, a senior official from the pro-Kurdish party HDP. "At the centre of this mandate is the Syrian government and Assad and the PKK, not Islamic State."
The party's co-chairman Selahattin Demirtas met Davutoglu on Wednesday, "but no tangible action plan or promise to help protect Kurds was presented. These are just words of consolation," Kurkcu told Reuters.
Demirtas said Davutoglu needed to back up his promise to help Kobani with action.
"Davutoglu's statement is the first expression of a change of stance by the government. But it has to be put into practice. Even this second it is important for logistical support to be sent to Kobani," he told the Hurriyet daily.
U.S.-led forces have been bombing Islamic State targets in Syria and Iraq, hitting a village near Kobani on Wednesday. Turkey has so far resisted a frontline military role.
President Tayyip Erdogan insists air strikes alone will not contain the Islamic State threat, and wants simultaneous action to be taken against Assad's government, including the creation of a no-fly zone on the Syrian side of the border.
"You know what will happen if there isn't a no-fly zone? ISIL bases will be bombed and then the Syrian regime, Assad, who has committed all those massacres, believing that he is now legitimate, will bide his time and bomb Aleppo," Davutoglu said.
"ISIL withdraws, the Free Syria Army (moderate opposition forces) are weak, and the regime will hit Aleppo with all its might. Three million people will start moving from Aleppo to Turkey," he said.
Thursday's parliamentary vote extended a mandate initially intended to allow Ankara to strike Kurdish militants in northern Iraq and to defend against any threat from Assad's forces.
Those objectives remain in place, complicating its policy towards Islamic State and meaning it is likely to remain reluctant to take a full role in the U.S.-led coalition.
"Turkey's Syria policy is awash with confusing and often conflicting priorities ... (the) policy is to degrade ISIS and Assad alike while also subjugating the PKK," said Soner Cagaptay, director of the Turkish Research Program at The Washington Institute. (Additional reporting by Humeyra Pamuk and Orhan Coskun in Ankara; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Peter Graff)
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/ ... KN20141003
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Fri Oct 03, 2014 7:55 pm
Firat News
Co-chairs on the way to Kobanê border
The co-chairs of Democratic Society Congress (DTK), Peoples' Democratic Congress (HDK), Party of Democratic Regions (DBP) and People’s Democratic Party (HDP) held a joint press conference in Amed (Diyarbakır) regarding the ongoing attacks of ISIS on the Kobanê canton of West Kurdistan.
Co-chair of DTK, Selma Irmak, co-chair of HDP, Figen Yüksekdağ, co-chairs of DBP, Kamuran Yüksek and Emine Ayla, spokespersons of HDK, Ertuğrul Kürkçü and Sebahat Tuncel, attended the press conference to call attention to the ongoing attacks on Kobanê and the resistance of the Kobanê people and protection units.
The co-chairs of the DTK, HDK, DBP, HDP will go to Suruç and Kobanê in solidarity with the people of town encircled by ISIS gangs, and the people on vigil at Suruç border in solidarity with the Kobanê resistance.
Anthea: The people of Kobani do NOT want those idiots standing safely inside the Turkish border talking about solidarity - they need armed support not political bandwagon jumpers
The spokesperson of the HDK, Ertuğrul Kürkçü, stressed that Kobanê has no friends but those struggling for freedom, democracy and a common liberation of all the peoples. Kürkçü stated that the war mandate of the government was not for the sake of the people of Kobanê.
HDP co-chair Figen Yüksekdağ said the feast days should be cheerfully welcomed by all the peoples, but now has been made miserable to all the oppressed. Yüksekdağ stressed that the people of Kobanê has undertaken the responsibility of resisting against a savagery on behalf of the humanity.
Yüksekdağ said the Kobanê resistance must be supported and shared, and called on the people of Turkey to act in solidarity with the people of Kobanê.
Speaking after, the co-chair of the DBP, Emine Ayna, said they will not allow the sacrifice of Kobanê people in the feast of sacrifice. Ayna stressed that the Middle East is being reshaped and witnessing a conflict, adding that ISIS was a proxy organisation being used as a means of massacre against the oppressed peoples in the Middle East. Ayna emphasised that despite all the attacks the Kurdish people will continue to give a struggle for existence as they have done so far, and attain their freedom.
DTK co-chair Selma Irmak said the people of Kobanê are facing a threat of massacre today and called on the world public to see the humanitarian tragedy in Kobanê. Irmak also stressed that; “ISIS must be well aware that these lands are the lands of Kurdistan. The people of Kurdistan are resisting today as they have always done in their history. Kurdistan is not like any other place. They must know that the Kurdish people are going to continue the resistance to the end."
Speaking after, the spokeswoman of the HDK, Sebahat Tuncel, said true peace will not be attained unless the threat of massacre in Kobanê is eliminated. Tuncel said the only way for the peoples to do against genocide was to resist.
Tuncel said the ISIS was being provided support by Turkey, adding; "Everyone must clarify which side they are on. Are you on the side of resolution and peace? Or will you be siding with this organisation committing crimes against humanity?” Tuncel asked.
Following the press conference, the co-chairs departed the border district of Suruç, of Urfa province, where a vigil is being held by Kurdish people since the beginning of the attacks on Kobanê on 15 September.
Some of the co-chairs will then cross into Kobanê on the first day of the Eid (Muslim festival of sacrifices) in solidarity with the people of town encircled by ISIS gangs, while others will stay in Suruç in support of the people on vigil in solidarity with the Kobanê resistance.
Co-chairs on the way to Kobanê border
The co-chairs of Democratic Society Congress (DTK), Peoples' Democratic Congress (HDK), Party of Democratic Regions (DBP) and People’s Democratic Party (HDP) held a joint press conference in Amed (Diyarbakır) regarding the ongoing attacks of ISIS on the Kobanê canton of West Kurdistan.
Co-chair of DTK, Selma Irmak, co-chair of HDP, Figen Yüksekdağ, co-chairs of DBP, Kamuran Yüksek and Emine Ayla, spokespersons of HDK, Ertuğrul Kürkçü and Sebahat Tuncel, attended the press conference to call attention to the ongoing attacks on Kobanê and the resistance of the Kobanê people and protection units.
The co-chairs of the DTK, HDK, DBP, HDP will go to Suruç and Kobanê in solidarity with the people of town encircled by ISIS gangs, and the people on vigil at Suruç border in solidarity with the Kobanê resistance.
Anthea: The people of Kobani do NOT want those idiots standing safely inside the Turkish border talking about solidarity - they need armed support not political bandwagon jumpers
The spokesperson of the HDK, Ertuğrul Kürkçü, stressed that Kobanê has no friends but those struggling for freedom, democracy and a common liberation of all the peoples. Kürkçü stated that the war mandate of the government was not for the sake of the people of Kobanê.
HDP co-chair Figen Yüksekdağ said the feast days should be cheerfully welcomed by all the peoples, but now has been made miserable to all the oppressed. Yüksekdağ stressed that the people of Kobanê has undertaken the responsibility of resisting against a savagery on behalf of the humanity.
Yüksekdağ said the Kobanê resistance must be supported and shared, and called on the people of Turkey to act in solidarity with the people of Kobanê.
Speaking after, the co-chair of the DBP, Emine Ayna, said they will not allow the sacrifice of Kobanê people in the feast of sacrifice. Ayna stressed that the Middle East is being reshaped and witnessing a conflict, adding that ISIS was a proxy organisation being used as a means of massacre against the oppressed peoples in the Middle East. Ayna emphasised that despite all the attacks the Kurdish people will continue to give a struggle for existence as they have done so far, and attain their freedom.
DTK co-chair Selma Irmak said the people of Kobanê are facing a threat of massacre today and called on the world public to see the humanitarian tragedy in Kobanê. Irmak also stressed that; “ISIS must be well aware that these lands are the lands of Kurdistan. The people of Kurdistan are resisting today as they have always done in their history. Kurdistan is not like any other place. They must know that the Kurdish people are going to continue the resistance to the end."
Speaking after, the spokeswoman of the HDK, Sebahat Tuncel, said true peace will not be attained unless the threat of massacre in Kobanê is eliminated. Tuncel said the only way for the peoples to do against genocide was to resist.
Tuncel said the ISIS was being provided support by Turkey, adding; "Everyone must clarify which side they are on. Are you on the side of resolution and peace? Or will you be siding with this organisation committing crimes against humanity?” Tuncel asked.
Following the press conference, the co-chairs departed the border district of Suruç, of Urfa province, where a vigil is being held by Kurdish people since the beginning of the attacks on Kobanê on 15 September.
Some of the co-chairs will then cross into Kobanê on the first day of the Eid (Muslim festival of sacrifices) in solidarity with the people of town encircled by ISIS gangs, while others will stay in Suruç in support of the people on vigil in solidarity with the Kobanê resistance.
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Fri Oct 03, 2014 8:07 pm
Kurdish Female Warriors On The Front Lines
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Fri Oct 03, 2014 8:12 pm
CNN
Kurdish fighter: ISIS has entered Syrian city of Kobani
ISIS fighters entered the besieged Syrian Kurdish city of Kobani, a Kurdish fighter said Friday, setting the stage for a vicious street-to-street battle in the shadow of Turkey's border.
Alan Minbic, a fighter with the Kurdish People's Protection Unit, or YPG, told CNN that ISIS now controls the southwest corner of the city, known in Arabic as Ayn al-Arab.
However, there were conflicting reports. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a London-based monitoring group, said it did not believe that ISIS was in the city itself based on information from more than a dozen sources in Kobani.
If ISIS, also known as ISIL and the Islamic State, takes Kobani, it will control a complete swath of land from its self-declared capital of Raqqa, Syria, on the Euphrates River to the Turkish border, more than 60 miles away.
Thousands of civilians have fled the predominantly Kurdish city in northern Syria in recent days as ISIS forces apparently have advanced inexorably toward it.
The Sunni extremist group's reported entry into the city comes a day after Turkish lawmakers voted overwhelmingly to authorize military force against ISIS in Iraq and Syria. Australia decided hours later to join the U.S.-led air campaign against ISIS in Iraq.
Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu vowed to help the Kurdish fighters defend Kobani from ISIS.
"We wouldn't want Kobani to fall," he said. "We welcomed our brothers who came from Kobani. We'll do whatever we can to prevent this from happening."
For months, ISIS has been advancing, capturing portions of northern and eastern Syria and western and northern Iraq for what it says is its new Islamic state, or caliphate.
The fighting has only intensified in the region in recent days, with ISIS nearly surrounding Kobani, not far from Turkey's border. Remaining civilians were ordered Thursday to evacuate and headed to the border, as Kurdish fighters declared their readiness to take on the ISIS militants in street warfare.
Snipers take aim
YPG fighters are now using snipers in an effort to prevent the ISIS militants from advancing farther, Minbic said.
On the eastern edge of Kobani, city defenders destroyed an ISIS tank, Minbic said, but on the western side, ISIS now controls an area called Tal Shair, which includes an informal border crossing.
Mousa Al Ahmad, a Free Syrian Army fighter in Kobani, gave CNN the same information on the ISIS advance into the southwest of the city, in a separate phone conversation. He said there were about 300 FSA fighters battling alongside the YPG in the city.
A CNN team nearby could hear bursts of small arms fire -- suggesting close-quarters fighting -- that appeared to be coming from around the southwest part of the city.
A sustained bombardment by ISIS rained down, particularly on the eastern side of Kobani, perhaps the heaviest seen in days.
People still in the city told CNN they expected ISIS to enter soon and were ready for bloody street-to-street fighting. They believed they would have the upper hand, at least to start with, because they know the city.
One Kurdish fighter, who gave only his first name, Botan, told CNN on Thursday that they were not afraid to die if necessary.
"We know what will happen if ISIS takes over our town and what they will do to us," he said. "Our fight is not just for the Kurds, it is a fight for all of humanity. When people are getting their heads chopped off and tossed aside like animals, it is a duty to fight."
Big shift for Turkey
The mood of Turkey's leaders changed in recent days, with ISIS on the nation's doorstep and tens of thousands of people fleeing across its border.
The Turkish Parliament voted 298-98 to not only to let the country's military leave its borders to go after ISIS and other terror groups, but also to allow foreign troops to launch operations from Turkey.
The authorization, which came as ISIS fighters laid siege to towns just south of the Turkish border, takes effect Saturday.
It is a big shift for Turkey, a NATO member, which until now offered only tacit support to the U.S.-led coalition of about 40 nations going after ISIS in Iraq and Syria in various capacities.
The Prime Minister submitted a motion declaring that Turkey was seriously threatened by the chaos in Syria and Iraq.
On Friday, Syria accused Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of turning his country "into a springboard of aggression against Syria under the false claim of fighting terrorism and protecting Turkey's national security," according to letters from the Foreign and Expatriates Ministry to the United Nations, Syrian state news agency SANA reported.
The ministry said Turkey was responsible for "every single drop of blood that has been shed in Syria" because it provided political, military and logistical support to terrorist organizations and was a conduit for militants traveling to Syria.
U.S. airstrikes have been directed against ISIS positions in the Kobani area this week. But U.S. Central Command said there were no further strikes in the area overnight into Friday.
In a statement, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest praised the decisions by Turkey, Australia and Denmark to authorize military force against ISIS.
"We will continue to work with our international partners to expand our sustained and comprehensive approach to degrade and ultimately defeat ISIL through a variety of means, including military actions, efforts to stop terrorist financing, countering flows of foreign fighters into the region, and delegitimizing ISIL's extremist ideology," the statement said.
CNN military analyst Lt. Col. Rick Francona told CNN on Thursday that as the ISIS militants get closer to the city, targeting becomes much more difficult.
While Kobani residents were ordered to evacuate, many have refused. This means civilian casualties are probably also a concern, he said.
Special forces
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, speaking Friday after the Cabinet's decision to authorize airstrikes and the deployment of special forces in Iraq, said ISIS had "effectively declared war on the world" and posed a threat to Australia and its people.
ISIS must be disrupted and degraded, he said, and "it is absolutely in Australia's national interests that this mission go ahead."
The Cabinet authorized the deployment of Australian special forces into Iraq to "advise and assist" Iraqi forces, Abbott said, subject to final legal approvals from Iraq. Australian aircraft began flying support missions over Iraq this week.
Abbott warned that the deployment to Iraq could be "quite lengthy," lasting months rather than weeks, but that it would be no longer than strictly necessary.
"Yes, it is a combat deployment, but it is an essentially humanitarian mission to protect the people of Iraq and ultimately the people of Australia from the murderous rage of the ISIL death cult," he said.
Abbott said Australia's special forces would support Iraqi forces, in a way similar to those sent by the United States, which already has "quite a substantial special forces component on the ground," he said.
Australia has six Super Hornet strike fighters based in the United Arab Emirates, and Parliament has authorized the use of up to eight, said Air Chief Marshal Mark Binskin.
Australian authorities believe that there are at least 60 Australians fighting in the Middle East with terrorist groups, chiefly ISIS, and that at least 100 more support terrorist groups through funding and recruitment. Counterterrorism police have carried out raids in Australia in recent days.
On Friday, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper presented a motion before the House of Commons about the possibility of his nation taking part in military operations against ISIS in Iraq, including airstrikes. The lower house of Parliament is debating the issue.
Retired U.S. Gen. John Allen, who is coordinating the international effort against ISIS, said that he expects a campaign against Mosul within a year.
"Mosul is going to be a pretty important battle," he said. "This was the place where [ISIS leader] Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi exposed himself, it's the place where the difficulties of the ISF [Iraq Security Forces] began to cascade. ... I would say Mosul will go as an operation within a year."
Allen also said ISIS's financial structure must be attacked.
"A single round of air strikes will not defeat the enemy," he said. "[ISIS] operates in the financial space, and generates a lot of revenue, and while the counterattack against ISIS in the physical space is underway, there is going to be a concerted effort in the financial space also to try to deny it the revenue it generates every day, that gives it the oxygen it breathes. ..."
A father's plea
The father of British ISIS hostage John Cantlie, a journalist captured nearly two years ago, said he felt "great relief" when his son appeared in a video message showing he was still alive recently, along with a "feeling of despair and helplessness."
"I want John to know how very proud I am of him," Paul Cantlie said in a video message delivered from a hospital bed. "I can think of no greater joy than seeing my dear son released and allowed to return home to those that love him."
Cantlie is the latest hostage to be paraded out by ISIS and forced to deliver the group's propaganda.
In a video released Thursday, Cantlie -- wearing an orange shirt and seated alone at a desk with a black backdrop -- said he is sending what will be the first in a series of messages on behalf of the group.
Cantlie, a photojournalist who also wrote several articles for major British newspapers, was kidnapped in November 2012 along with American journalist James Foley.
ISIS released a video of Foley's beheading last month. This month, the group released videos showing the slayings of two other Western hostages, American journalist Steven Sotloff and British aid worker David Haines.
In his video message to ISIS, Paul Cantlie, 81, said: "To those holding John -- please know that he is a good man, he sought only to help the Syrian people and I ask you, from all that is sacred, to help us and allow him to return home."
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/10/03/world ... irstrikes/
Kurdish fighter: ISIS has entered Syrian city of Kobani
ISIS fighters entered the besieged Syrian Kurdish city of Kobani, a Kurdish fighter said Friday, setting the stage for a vicious street-to-street battle in the shadow of Turkey's border.
Alan Minbic, a fighter with the Kurdish People's Protection Unit, or YPG, told CNN that ISIS now controls the southwest corner of the city, known in Arabic as Ayn al-Arab.
However, there were conflicting reports. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a London-based monitoring group, said it did not believe that ISIS was in the city itself based on information from more than a dozen sources in Kobani.
If ISIS, also known as ISIL and the Islamic State, takes Kobani, it will control a complete swath of land from its self-declared capital of Raqqa, Syria, on the Euphrates River to the Turkish border, more than 60 miles away.
Thousands of civilians have fled the predominantly Kurdish city in northern Syria in recent days as ISIS forces apparently have advanced inexorably toward it.
The Sunni extremist group's reported entry into the city comes a day after Turkish lawmakers voted overwhelmingly to authorize military force against ISIS in Iraq and Syria. Australia decided hours later to join the U.S.-led air campaign against ISIS in Iraq.
Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu vowed to help the Kurdish fighters defend Kobani from ISIS.
"We wouldn't want Kobani to fall," he said. "We welcomed our brothers who came from Kobani. We'll do whatever we can to prevent this from happening."
For months, ISIS has been advancing, capturing portions of northern and eastern Syria and western and northern Iraq for what it says is its new Islamic state, or caliphate.
The fighting has only intensified in the region in recent days, with ISIS nearly surrounding Kobani, not far from Turkey's border. Remaining civilians were ordered Thursday to evacuate and headed to the border, as Kurdish fighters declared their readiness to take on the ISIS militants in street warfare.
Snipers take aim
YPG fighters are now using snipers in an effort to prevent the ISIS militants from advancing farther, Minbic said.
On the eastern edge of Kobani, city defenders destroyed an ISIS tank, Minbic said, but on the western side, ISIS now controls an area called Tal Shair, which includes an informal border crossing.
Mousa Al Ahmad, a Free Syrian Army fighter in Kobani, gave CNN the same information on the ISIS advance into the southwest of the city, in a separate phone conversation. He said there were about 300 FSA fighters battling alongside the YPG in the city.
A CNN team nearby could hear bursts of small arms fire -- suggesting close-quarters fighting -- that appeared to be coming from around the southwest part of the city.
A sustained bombardment by ISIS rained down, particularly on the eastern side of Kobani, perhaps the heaviest seen in days.
People still in the city told CNN they expected ISIS to enter soon and were ready for bloody street-to-street fighting. They believed they would have the upper hand, at least to start with, because they know the city.
One Kurdish fighter, who gave only his first name, Botan, told CNN on Thursday that they were not afraid to die if necessary.
"We know what will happen if ISIS takes over our town and what they will do to us," he said. "Our fight is not just for the Kurds, it is a fight for all of humanity. When people are getting their heads chopped off and tossed aside like animals, it is a duty to fight."
Big shift for Turkey
The mood of Turkey's leaders changed in recent days, with ISIS on the nation's doorstep and tens of thousands of people fleeing across its border.
The Turkish Parliament voted 298-98 to not only to let the country's military leave its borders to go after ISIS and other terror groups, but also to allow foreign troops to launch operations from Turkey.
The authorization, which came as ISIS fighters laid siege to towns just south of the Turkish border, takes effect Saturday.
It is a big shift for Turkey, a NATO member, which until now offered only tacit support to the U.S.-led coalition of about 40 nations going after ISIS in Iraq and Syria in various capacities.
The Prime Minister submitted a motion declaring that Turkey was seriously threatened by the chaos in Syria and Iraq.
On Friday, Syria accused Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of turning his country "into a springboard of aggression against Syria under the false claim of fighting terrorism and protecting Turkey's national security," according to letters from the Foreign and Expatriates Ministry to the United Nations, Syrian state news agency SANA reported.
The ministry said Turkey was responsible for "every single drop of blood that has been shed in Syria" because it provided political, military and logistical support to terrorist organizations and was a conduit for militants traveling to Syria.
U.S. airstrikes have been directed against ISIS positions in the Kobani area this week. But U.S. Central Command said there were no further strikes in the area overnight into Friday.
In a statement, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest praised the decisions by Turkey, Australia and Denmark to authorize military force against ISIS.
"We will continue to work with our international partners to expand our sustained and comprehensive approach to degrade and ultimately defeat ISIL through a variety of means, including military actions, efforts to stop terrorist financing, countering flows of foreign fighters into the region, and delegitimizing ISIL's extremist ideology," the statement said.
CNN military analyst Lt. Col. Rick Francona told CNN on Thursday that as the ISIS militants get closer to the city, targeting becomes much more difficult.
While Kobani residents were ordered to evacuate, many have refused. This means civilian casualties are probably also a concern, he said.
Special forces
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, speaking Friday after the Cabinet's decision to authorize airstrikes and the deployment of special forces in Iraq, said ISIS had "effectively declared war on the world" and posed a threat to Australia and its people.
ISIS must be disrupted and degraded, he said, and "it is absolutely in Australia's national interests that this mission go ahead."
The Cabinet authorized the deployment of Australian special forces into Iraq to "advise and assist" Iraqi forces, Abbott said, subject to final legal approvals from Iraq. Australian aircraft began flying support missions over Iraq this week.
Abbott warned that the deployment to Iraq could be "quite lengthy," lasting months rather than weeks, but that it would be no longer than strictly necessary.
"Yes, it is a combat deployment, but it is an essentially humanitarian mission to protect the people of Iraq and ultimately the people of Australia from the murderous rage of the ISIL death cult," he said.
Abbott said Australia's special forces would support Iraqi forces, in a way similar to those sent by the United States, which already has "quite a substantial special forces component on the ground," he said.
Australia has six Super Hornet strike fighters based in the United Arab Emirates, and Parliament has authorized the use of up to eight, said Air Chief Marshal Mark Binskin.
Australian authorities believe that there are at least 60 Australians fighting in the Middle East with terrorist groups, chiefly ISIS, and that at least 100 more support terrorist groups through funding and recruitment. Counterterrorism police have carried out raids in Australia in recent days.
On Friday, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper presented a motion before the House of Commons about the possibility of his nation taking part in military operations against ISIS in Iraq, including airstrikes. The lower house of Parliament is debating the issue.
Retired U.S. Gen. John Allen, who is coordinating the international effort against ISIS, said that he expects a campaign against Mosul within a year.
"Mosul is going to be a pretty important battle," he said. "This was the place where [ISIS leader] Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi exposed himself, it's the place where the difficulties of the ISF [Iraq Security Forces] began to cascade. ... I would say Mosul will go as an operation within a year."
Allen also said ISIS's financial structure must be attacked.
"A single round of air strikes will not defeat the enemy," he said. "[ISIS] operates in the financial space, and generates a lot of revenue, and while the counterattack against ISIS in the physical space is underway, there is going to be a concerted effort in the financial space also to try to deny it the revenue it generates every day, that gives it the oxygen it breathes. ..."
A father's plea
The father of British ISIS hostage John Cantlie, a journalist captured nearly two years ago, said he felt "great relief" when his son appeared in a video message showing he was still alive recently, along with a "feeling of despair and helplessness."
"I want John to know how very proud I am of him," Paul Cantlie said in a video message delivered from a hospital bed. "I can think of no greater joy than seeing my dear son released and allowed to return home to those that love him."
Cantlie is the latest hostage to be paraded out by ISIS and forced to deliver the group's propaganda.
In a video released Thursday, Cantlie -- wearing an orange shirt and seated alone at a desk with a black backdrop -- said he is sending what will be the first in a series of messages on behalf of the group.
Cantlie, a photojournalist who also wrote several articles for major British newspapers, was kidnapped in November 2012 along with American journalist James Foley.
ISIS released a video of Foley's beheading last month. This month, the group released videos showing the slayings of two other Western hostages, American journalist Steven Sotloff and British aid worker David Haines.
In his video message to ISIS, Paul Cantlie, 81, said: "To those holding John -- please know that he is a good man, he sought only to help the Syrian people and I ask you, from all that is sacred, to help us and allow him to return home."
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/10/03/world ... irstrikes/
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Fri Oct 03, 2014 8:16 pm
Now preparing for street fighting in Kobani
ISIS tanks at edge of city
ISIS tanks at edge of city
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Sat Oct 04, 2014 12:56 am
BBC News
Turkey tanks idle as IS attacks Kobane
Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu vowed to protect the border town Kobane from IS occupation after Turkey authorised military operations against militants in Iraq and Syria.
But despite Thursday's parliamentary decision, Turkey seems wary of getting involved.
There are no signs of any imminent Turkish move to stop the town falling.
It seems likely the government will once again press members of the US-led coalition to create a no-fly zone before sending troops anywhere across the border.
The BBC's Paul Adams reports that Kobane is still under attack while a squadron of Turkish tanks sits idle a few hundred metres away.
Link to video of Turkish military doing nothing watching Kobani die
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-29486232
Turkey tanks idle as IS attacks Kobane
Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu vowed to protect the border town Kobane from IS occupation after Turkey authorised military operations against militants in Iraq and Syria.
But despite Thursday's parliamentary decision, Turkey seems wary of getting involved.
There are no signs of any imminent Turkish move to stop the town falling.
It seems likely the government will once again press members of the US-led coalition to create a no-fly zone before sending troops anywhere across the border.
The BBC's Paul Adams reports that Kobane is still under attack while a squadron of Turkish tanks sits idle a few hundred metres away.
Link to video of Turkish military doing nothing watching Kobani die
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-29486232
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Sat Oct 04, 2014 10:20 am
Posted on Twitter 11:04 AM - 4 Oct 2014
https://twitter.com/DrWidadAkrawi/statu ... 6563196928
This infers the prescence of civilians still in Kobani
Many earlier posts and news items stated that all the civilians had left Kobani and only Kurdish fighters remain
I hate Turkey as much as I hate IS
KOBANE RESIDENTS RUNNING LOW ON FOOD, WATER & CHILDREN MILK #DrWidad☮
https://twitter.com/DrWidadAkrawi/statu ... 6563196928
This infers the prescence of civilians still in Kobani
Many earlier posts and news items stated that all the civilians had left Kobani and only Kurdish fighters remain
I hate Turkey as much as I hate IS
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Sat Oct 04, 2014 10:33 am
TURKISH FORCES PREVENT SUPPLIES REACH KOBANE
To call the Turkish military dogs would be an insult to dogs
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Sat Oct 04, 2014 2:23 pm
BBC News Middle East
Islamic State conflict: Clashes at Turkish-Syrian border
Clashes have broken out on the tense border between Turkey and Syria, where tens of thousands of Syrians have fled to escape Islamic State (IS) militants.
A number of refugees on the border were demonstrating when Turkish authorities used tear gas to break it up.
Meanwhile IS are continuing to bomb the Syrian town of Kobane.
The BBC's Paul Adams, who is on the border, says there is a sense of a "gradual squeezing" of the area by IS.
Link to excelent BBC Video:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-29488474
Islamic State conflict: Clashes at Turkish-Syrian border
Clashes have broken out on the tense border between Turkey and Syria, where tens of thousands of Syrians have fled to escape Islamic State (IS) militants.
A number of refugees on the border were demonstrating when Turkish authorities used tear gas to break it up.
Meanwhile IS are continuing to bomb the Syrian town of Kobane.
The BBC's Paul Adams, who is on the border, says there is a sense of a "gradual squeezing" of the area by IS.
Link to excelent BBC Video:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-29488474
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Sat Oct 04, 2014 3:23 pm
BBC News Update
Kurds clash with Turkish security forces on Syria border
Turkish Kurds and refugees from fighting in Syria have clashed with Turkish security forces on the border between the two countries.
Troops used tear gas and water cannon to disperse protesters angry at the situation in Syria, where IS militants are closing in on the town of Kobane.
Meanwhile unconfirmed reports say at least 35 militants were killed in US-led air strikes over northern Syria.
They come amid a Turkish-US row over alleged support for Syrian militants.
On Friday US Vice-President Joe Biden criticised Turkey and US allies in the Arab world for supporting Sunni militant groups such as Islamic State, prompting a sharp response from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
"If Mr Biden used such language, that would make him a man of the past for me," he told a news conference in Istanbul.
"No-one can accuse Turkey of having supported any terrorist organisation in Syria, including IS."
The situation in Kobane does not appear to have changed dramatically, he adds, though some mortar and small arms fire has been heard in recent hours. But IS is getting closer and US-led air strikes are not stopping the advance.
Full Update:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-29490256
Kurds clash with Turkish security forces on Syria border
Turkish Kurds and refugees from fighting in Syria have clashed with Turkish security forces on the border between the two countries.
Troops used tear gas and water cannon to disperse protesters angry at the situation in Syria, where IS militants are closing in on the town of Kobane.
Meanwhile unconfirmed reports say at least 35 militants were killed in US-led air strikes over northern Syria.
They come amid a Turkish-US row over alleged support for Syrian militants.
On Friday US Vice-President Joe Biden criticised Turkey and US allies in the Arab world for supporting Sunni militant groups such as Islamic State, prompting a sharp response from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
"If Mr Biden used such language, that would make him a man of the past for me," he told a news conference in Istanbul.
"No-one can accuse Turkey of having supported any terrorist organisation in Syria, including IS."
The situation in Kobane does not appear to have changed dramatically, he adds, though some mortar and small arms fire has been heard in recent hours. But IS is getting closer and US-led air strikes are not stopping the advance.
Full Update:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-29490256
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Sat Oct 04, 2014 8:58 pm
Reuters
Turkey steels for action as Islamic State advances on Syrian border town
By Ayla Jean Yackley and Alexander Dziadosz
* Air strikes fail to end siege of Syrian border town
* PKK militant group warns of end to Turkish peace talks
* Biden warns of "long fight" against Islamic State
* Refugees continue to flee Kobani
* Turkish parliament to vote on mandate for military action (Adds Biden comments)
Turkey's parliament authorised the government on Thursday to order military action against Islamic State as the insurgents tightened their grip on a Syrian border town, sending thousands more Kurdish refugees into Turkey.
The vote gives the government powers to order incursions into Syria and Iraq to counter the threat of attack "from all terrorist groups", although there was little sign any such action was imminent.
The mandate also allows foreign troops to launch operations from Turkey, a NATO member that hosts a U.S. air base in its southern town of Incirlik, but which has so far resisted a frontline role in the military campaign against the insurgents.
"The rising influence of radical groups in Syria threatens Turkey's national security. ... The aim of this mandate is to minimise as much as possible the impact of the clashes on our borders," Defence Minister Ismet Yilmaz told parliament.
Islamic State fighters advanced to within a few km (miles) of the mainly Kurdish border town of Kobani on three sides on Thursday, extending their gains after taking control of hundreds of villages around the town in recent weeks.
Smoke rose behind hills to the south of Kobani as the insurgents continued their shelling into the night. Dozens of anti-tank missiles with bright-red tracers flashed through the sky as darkness enveloped the town.
Kobani's electricity supply was cut after militants bombarded a local power grid, a Kurdish fighter told Reuters.
In neighbouring Iraq, which also borders Turkey, the insurgents have carried out mass executions, abducted women and girls as sex slaves, and used children as fighters in what 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 and Iraq, hit a village near Kobani on Wednesday. Sources in the town, which is known as Ayn al-Arab in Arabic, reported strikes farther south overnight.
The U.S. Central Command reported that U.S. and other forces in the coalition conducted four strikes on Wednesday and Thursday in Syria and seven in Iraq. Targets included buildings, tanks and other armed vehicles.
But such strikes seemed to have done 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.
Kurdish militants in Turkey warned that peace talks with Ankara, meant to end a three-decade insurgency, would collapse if the Islamist insurgents were allowed to carry out a massacre.
The British-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 confirmed the deaths of 16 Islamic State fighters and seven Kurdish militants but that the true toll was likely to be 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.
TURKEY HESITANT
The Turkish parliamentary vote extended a mandate initially intended to allow Ankara to strike Kurdish militants in northern Iraq and to defend itself against any threat from Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces.
But it does not necessarily signal imminent action. President Tayyip Erdogan insists U.S.-led air strikes alone will not contain the Islamic State threat and is calling for the removal of Assad, an aim not shared by the U.S.-led military coalition for the current military campaign. Ankara is unlikely to act alone.
The Turkish army has, however, 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 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.
Ankara 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.
'HELL OF A LONG FIGHT'
Islamic State has carved out swathes of eastern Syria and western Iraq in a drive to create a cross-border caliphate, terrifying communities into submission by slaughtering those who resist.
U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said in a speech on Thursday that the battle to stop the Islamic State militants' advance in Syria and Iraq was going to be a "hell of a long fight" for the United States and its coalition partners.
In a speech at Harvard, he defended the U.S. decision to wait until last month to begin air strikes against Islamic State targets in Syria, saying Washington needed to wait for nations including Saudi Arabia and Qatar to be willing to offer support.
The United States has been carrying out strikes in Iraq against the militant group, which is commonly known by its former acronym of ISIS, 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.
U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said on Thursday he discussed with France its possible involvement in the U.S.-led campaign in Syria. But his French counterpart, Jean-Yves Le Drian, would not be drawn on whether Paris might join in air strikes.
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.
Islamic State fighters on the border with Turkey 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 back wholeheartedly a military strategy that does not target Assad.
(Additional reporting by Orhan Coskun and Tulay Karadeniz in Ankara, Daren Butler in Istanbul, Stephen Brown in Berlin, Rahim Salman and Yara Bayoumy in Baghdad, Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva, Fiona Ortiz in Chicago, Phil Stewart and David Alexander in Washington, Scott Malone in Cambridge, Mass., and John Irish in Paris; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Anna Willard, Giles Elgood, David Stamp and Peter Cooney)
http://www.trust.org/item/2014100218480 ... dlineStory
Turkey steels for action as Islamic State advances on Syrian border town
By Ayla Jean Yackley and Alexander Dziadosz
* Air strikes fail to end siege of Syrian border town
* PKK militant group warns of end to Turkish peace talks
* Biden warns of "long fight" against Islamic State
* Refugees continue to flee Kobani
* Turkish parliament to vote on mandate for military action (Adds Biden comments)
Turkey's parliament authorised the government on Thursday to order military action against Islamic State as the insurgents tightened their grip on a Syrian border town, sending thousands more Kurdish refugees into Turkey.
The vote gives the government powers to order incursions into Syria and Iraq to counter the threat of attack "from all terrorist groups", although there was little sign any such action was imminent.
The mandate also allows foreign troops to launch operations from Turkey, a NATO member that hosts a U.S. air base in its southern town of Incirlik, but which has so far resisted a frontline role in the military campaign against the insurgents.
"The rising influence of radical groups in Syria threatens Turkey's national security. ... The aim of this mandate is to minimise as much as possible the impact of the clashes on our borders," Defence Minister Ismet Yilmaz told parliament.
Islamic State fighters advanced to within a few km (miles) of the mainly Kurdish border town of Kobani on three sides on Thursday, extending their gains after taking control of hundreds of villages around the town in recent weeks.
Smoke rose behind hills to the south of Kobani as the insurgents continued their shelling into the night. Dozens of anti-tank missiles with bright-red tracers flashed through the sky as darkness enveloped the town.
Kobani's electricity supply was cut after militants bombarded a local power grid, a Kurdish fighter told Reuters.
In neighbouring Iraq, which also borders Turkey, the insurgents have carried out mass executions, abducted women and girls as sex slaves, and used children as fighters in what 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 and Iraq, hit a village near Kobani on Wednesday. Sources in the town, which is known as Ayn al-Arab in Arabic, reported strikes farther south overnight.
The U.S. Central Command reported that U.S. and other forces in the coalition conducted four strikes on Wednesday and Thursday in Syria and seven in Iraq. Targets included buildings, tanks and other armed vehicles.
But such strikes seemed to have done 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.
Kurdish militants in Turkey warned that peace talks with Ankara, meant to end a three-decade insurgency, would collapse if the Islamist insurgents were allowed to carry out a massacre.
The British-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 confirmed the deaths of 16 Islamic State fighters and seven Kurdish militants but that the true toll was likely to be 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.
TURKEY HESITANT
The Turkish parliamentary vote extended a mandate initially intended to allow Ankara to strike Kurdish militants in northern Iraq and to defend itself against any threat from Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces.
But it does not necessarily signal imminent action. President Tayyip Erdogan insists U.S.-led air strikes alone will not contain the Islamic State threat and is calling for the removal of Assad, an aim not shared by the U.S.-led military coalition for the current military campaign. Ankara is unlikely to act alone.
The Turkish army has, however, 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 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.
Ankara 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.
'HELL OF A LONG FIGHT'
Islamic State has carved out swathes of eastern Syria and western Iraq in a drive to create a cross-border caliphate, terrifying communities into submission by slaughtering those who resist.
U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said in a speech on Thursday that the battle to stop the Islamic State militants' advance in Syria and Iraq was going to be a "hell of a long fight" for the United States and its coalition partners.
In a speech at Harvard, he defended the U.S. decision to wait until last month to begin air strikes against Islamic State targets in Syria, saying Washington needed to wait for nations including Saudi Arabia and Qatar to be willing to offer support.
The United States has been carrying out strikes in Iraq against the militant group, which is commonly known by its former acronym of ISIS, 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.
U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said on Thursday he discussed with France its possible involvement in the U.S.-led campaign in Syria. But his French counterpart, Jean-Yves Le Drian, would not be drawn on whether Paris might join in air strikes.
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.
Islamic State fighters on the border with Turkey 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 back wholeheartedly a military strategy that does not target Assad.
(Additional reporting by Orhan Coskun and Tulay Karadeniz in Ankara, Daren Butler in Istanbul, Stephen Brown in Berlin, Rahim Salman and Yara Bayoumy in Baghdad, Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva, Fiona Ortiz in Chicago, Phil Stewart and David Alexander in Washington, Scott Malone in Cambridge, Mass., and John Irish in Paris; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Anna Willard, Giles Elgood, David Stamp and Peter Cooney)
http://www.trust.org/item/2014100218480 ... dlineStory
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Re: ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD
Author: Anthea » Sat Oct 04, 2014 9:20 pm
RT
Battle for Kobane: Turkey fires tear gas at activists trying to enter Syria (VIDEO)
Turkey’s security forces have fired tear gas at dozens of Turkish and Kurdish activists trying to cross into Syria. On the other side of the border, a major city in Syrian Kurdistan is under increased assault from Islamic State militants.
Authorities used tear gas in the town of Suruc, Sanliurfa province, on Saturday as activists ignored calls to disperse, Turkey's Hurriyet daily reported.
The activists were reportedly trying to cross the border into Syria to help defend the city of Kobane against IS militants. The border city, located in Syria's north, is a strategic point for the jihadists; if the city falls to the militants, it would provide a direct link to their captured territories in Aleppo and Raqqa.
The Islamists have been attempting to capture Ayn al-Arab – also known under the Kurdish name of Kobane – since September. The Kurds have so far managed to keep control of the area, but militants have pledged to take it over by the beginning of Eid al-Adha, or Feast of Sacrifice.
Nevertheless, city authorities said on Saturday that the Kurds were still in control as fighting between the Syrian Kurdish militia (YPG) and IS militants continued, according to Turkey's Doğan News Agency.
The Kurdistan Workers' Party announced general mobilization to defend Kobane on Friday, as the city was under heavy shelling from IS, the Lebanese Al-Mayadeen TV channel reported. It also said that IS fighters claimed the southern and eastern approaches to the city.
The battle for Kobane comes after Turkey’s Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said on Thursday that Ankara would do “whatever we can” to stop IS from capturing Kobane, as the Turkish army received the green light from parliament to engage in military action against the insurgents in Syria and Iraq.
Ankara has strained relations with the largest ethnic Kurdish minority in the country, which has been demanding a separate state for decades while using both peaceful protests and guerrilla warfare.
On Saturday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan even compared the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) to IS militants.
"The IS for us are the same thing as the PKK. It's erroneous to consider and regard them separately. There are other terrorist organizations apart from them. And we, as well as the whole world, must assess them right," Erdogan told reporters at the celebration of Eid al-Adha in Istanbul.
Syria has warned Turkey that any military involvement on its territory would be considered an act of “real aggression against a member state of the United Nations."
Ankara has been one of the Syrian opposition’s major backers during the civil war to overthrow Syrian President Bashar Assad.
Turkey has been widely criticized for turning a blind eye to foreign radicals passing through the country en route to Syria.
The latest comments made by US Vice President Joe Biden on Thursday have outraged Erdogan. Biden stated that the Turkish president had admitted to making a mistake in allowing foreign fighters to cross the Turkish border into Syria.
Following the Turkish army's approval to use military force, no specific commitments have yet been made to stop IS. Meanwhile, airstrikes launched by the US-led coalition on Syria do not appear to be slowing down the advance of IS militants.
http://rt.com/news/193188-syria-turkey-border-kobane/
Battle for Kobane: Turkey fires tear gas at activists trying to enter Syria (VIDEO)
Turkey’s security forces have fired tear gas at dozens of Turkish and Kurdish activists trying to cross into Syria. On the other side of the border, a major city in Syrian Kurdistan is under increased assault from Islamic State militants.
Authorities used tear gas in the town of Suruc, Sanliurfa province, on Saturday as activists ignored calls to disperse, Turkey's Hurriyet daily reported.
The activists were reportedly trying to cross the border into Syria to help defend the city of Kobane against IS militants. The border city, located in Syria's north, is a strategic point for the jihadists; if the city falls to the militants, it would provide a direct link to their captured territories in Aleppo and Raqqa.
The Islamists have been attempting to capture Ayn al-Arab – also known under the Kurdish name of Kobane – since September. The Kurds have so far managed to keep control of the area, but militants have pledged to take it over by the beginning of Eid al-Adha, or Feast of Sacrifice.
Nevertheless, city authorities said on Saturday that the Kurds were still in control as fighting between the Syrian Kurdish militia (YPG) and IS militants continued, according to Turkey's Doğan News Agency.
The Kurdistan Workers' Party announced general mobilization to defend Kobane on Friday, as the city was under heavy shelling from IS, the Lebanese Al-Mayadeen TV channel reported. It also said that IS fighters claimed the southern and eastern approaches to the city.
The battle for Kobane comes after Turkey’s Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said on Thursday that Ankara would do “whatever we can” to stop IS from capturing Kobane, as the Turkish army received the green light from parliament to engage in military action against the insurgents in Syria and Iraq.
Ankara has strained relations with the largest ethnic Kurdish minority in the country, which has been demanding a separate state for decades while using both peaceful protests and guerrilla warfare.
On Saturday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan even compared the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) to IS militants.
"The IS for us are the same thing as the PKK. It's erroneous to consider and regard them separately. There are other terrorist organizations apart from them. And we, as well as the whole world, must assess them right," Erdogan told reporters at the celebration of Eid al-Adha in Istanbul.
Syria has warned Turkey that any military involvement on its territory would be considered an act of “real aggression against a member state of the United Nations."
Ankara has been one of the Syrian opposition’s major backers during the civil war to overthrow Syrian President Bashar Assad.
Turkey has been widely criticized for turning a blind eye to foreign radicals passing through the country en route to Syria.
The latest comments made by US Vice President Joe Biden on Thursday have outraged Erdogan. Biden stated that the Turkish president had admitted to making a mistake in allowing foreign fighters to cross the Turkish border into Syria.
Following the Turkish army's approval to use military force, no specific commitments have yet been made to stop IS. Meanwhile, airstrikes launched by the US-led coalition on Syria do not appear to be slowing down the advance of IS militants.
http://rt.com/news/193188-syria-turkey-border-kobane/
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