ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD

[Anthea]

BBC News

John Cantlie: Islamic State hostage in 'Kobane' video



British hostage John Cantlie has appeared in a new Islamic State (IS) video in which he says he is speaking from the key Syrian town of Kobane.

In an apparently scripted video, Mr Cantlie says the battle for the town on the Turkish border "is nearly over" and the militants are "mopping up now".

It is the latest in a series of videos featuring the 43-year-old journalist, who was seized in late 2012.

Kobane has seen intense fighting between Syrian Kurds and IS.

'Nasty and tough'

The clip, which lasts for five minutes and 32 seconds, also features footage that it is claimed was shot by an Islamic State-owned drone.

In it, Mr Cantlie says: "Now the battle for Kobane is coming to an end. The mujahedeen are just mopping up now, street to street, and building to building.

"You can occasionally hear erratic gunfire in the background as a result of those operations.

"But contrary to what the Western media would have you believe, it is not an all-out battle here now. It is nearly over. As you can hear, it is very quiet, just the occasional gunfire."

He adds: "Urban warfare is as about as nasty and tough as it gets, and it's something of a speciality of the mujahedeen."

The release of the video comes after the death of Mr Cantlie's father Paul, 80, who had recorded a video message from his hospital bed urging IS to release his son.

Jessica Cantlie, John Cantlie's sister, has also appealed for ''direct contact" with the militants.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-29796179?n ... ws_central

[Anthea]

FLASH ! ISIS Terrorists meet turkish terrorist-soldiers @kobane border and making team talk @war against Kurds -Please SHARE it everywhere !!
Part of channel(s): Syria (current event)

so @1:15 see it usa ,see it europe thats turkey ,your NATO brother ! kick turkey out of nato ! remove pkk from terrorlist ! kurdistan ,kurds are your friends but not turkey ! @middle east ONLY YPG PKK fighting like heros against these isis jihadi ape-terrorists , pkk attacked only on turkish terrorist soldiers until now , remove pkk ban ! usa/europe should see westkurdistan as an independent state. fuck turkey in ass .

Link to interesting video VERY interesting vidoe

Looks as though Turkish army is friends with IS:

http://www.liveleak.com/ll_embed?f=f92db24cad8b

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=375_1414432901

[Anthea]

The Huffington Post

ISIS Releases Video That Appears To Show British Hostage John Cantlie In Kobani

The Islamic State group released a video on Monday that appears to show British hostage John Cantlie in the Syrian border town of Kobani.

The 5-minute video, which is titled "Inside Ayn al-Islam," shows Cantlie walking in front of destroyed buildings in what appears to be Kobani. After mentioning international reports of Islamic State losses in the battle for the town, Cantlie says Kobani is about to fall completely into the militants' hands.

"Now the battle for Kobani is coming to an end," Cantlie says. "The mujahideen are just mopping up now, street to street, and building to building."

Militants of the Islamic State and Kurdish fighters have been battling for control of Kobani, also called Ayn al-Arab, for weeks. The extremist fighters have devoted massive resources to battle. The U.S.-led coalition has come to the aid of the Kurdish forces defending the town through air strikes and weapons droppings.

Monday's Islamic State video features footage of Kobani purportedly shot by an IS drone. The images show Kobani's streets, destroyed and deserted.

Monday's video is one of several released by the Islamic State featuring the British reporter since he was taken hostage about two years ago.

Cantlie, who has worked for the Sunday Times, the Sun and the Sunday Telegraph, was first taken hostage in Syria in 2012, but he was freed a week later by the Free Syrian Army. Cantlie reportedly then returned to Syria, where he was captured a second time along with U.S. journalist James Foley, who has since been executed.

The first video of Cantlie came in September and showed the journalist sitting alone at a desk, wearing an orange jumpsuit. Apparently reading from a script, Cantlie announced that he would be releasing a series of videos that would "show the truth" about the Islamic State.

The next three videos all showed Cantlie in similar hostage conditions.

In the fourth video, released just two weeks ago, Cantlie described his living conditions as "a dark room with a mattress on the floor... clean and comfortable." Monday's video is the first to show Cantlie outdoors.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/2 ... 56366.html

[Anthea]

Mail Online

Poster girl for Kurdish freedom fighters in Kobane is 'captured and beheaded by ISIS killers' who posted gruesome pictures online

Female Kurdish fighter whose picture became a web hit 'killed by Isis'
Image of 'Rehana' making a peace sign was retweeted thousands of times
Now there are claims that she has been captured and beheaded by Isis
She reportedly fought for the Kurdish Women's Defence Unit or YPJ
It's thought she was involved in the defence of Syrian border town Kobane

By Ted Thornhill

A female Kurdish fighter who became a poster girl for the Kobane resistance movement after a picture of her making a peace sign was retweeted thousands of times on Twitter has reportedly been beheaded by Isis.

The woman, known by the pseudonym Rehana, was celebrated as a symbol of hope for the embattled Syrian border town after a journalist tweeted a picture of her making a 'V-sign', claiming that she'd personally killed 100 Isis militants.

The message was retweeted over 5,000 times, but there are now claims Rehana, who fought for the Kurdish YPJ, or Women's Defense Unit, may have been killed after gruesome pictures began circulating on Twitter of an Isis fighter purportedly holding aloft her head.



Her death - reported on several sites including 9News.com - however, is unconfirmed and at the time of writing the YPG (People's Defense Unit) and YPJ have yet to respond to MailOnline's request for a comment.

Perched on the other side of the Turkish border, the Syrian town of Kobane has been under an intense assault by Isis, or the so-called Islamic State, for more than a month. The town - surrounded on the east, south and west by Isis - is being defended by Kurdish forces in Syria.

Among those fighters are thousands of women, an unusual phenomenon in the Muslim world in which warfare is often associated with manhood.

In April, Kurdish fighters created all-female combat units that have grown to include more than 10,000 women.

These female fighters have played a major role in battles against IS, said Nasser Haj Mansour, a defense official in Syria's Kurdish region.

The Kurdish women now find themselves battling militants preaching an extreme form of Islam dictating that women only leave the house if absolutely necessary.

One Kurdish female fighter, who uses the nom de guerre of Afshin Kobani, used to be a teacher.

Now, the Kurdish Syrian woman has traded the classroom for the front lines in the battle for the town.

The 28-year-old Kurdish fighter said she decided to join the fight in her hometown when she saw Isis advances in Syria.

'I lost many friends to this, and I decided there was a need to join up,' said Kobani, who declined to reveal her birth name. 'This is our land - our own - and if we don't do it, who else will?'

After more than a year of fighting, Kobani has risen through the ranks to become a commander of a mixed-gender unit. 'We are just the same as men; there's no difference,' she said. 'We can do any type of job, including armed mobilization.'

There is nothing new about Kurdish women fighters. They have fought alongside men for years in a guerrilla war against Turkey, seeking an independent Kurdistan which would encompass parts of Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran.

The campaign for Kurdish independence has been pursued mainly by leftist militant groups that championed gender equality, such as the Kurdistan Workers Party in Turkey.

Suicide bombings have long been part of the Kurdish women fighters' battleground repertory.

Early this month, Deilar Kanj Khamis, better known by her military name Arin Mirkan, blew herself up outside Kobani, killing 10 IS fighters, according to Kurdish forces.

Haj Mansour, the Kurdish defense official, recounted that Kurdish fighters were forced to withdraw from a strategic hill south of the besieged town. Khamis stayed behind, attacking IS fighters with gunfire and grenades as they moved in.

Surrounded, she detonated explosives strapped to her body. The Kurds then recaptured the position - but lost it again on Wednesday.

Earlier this month the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors events in Syria, reported Isis militants beheaded nine Kurdish fighters, including three women, captured in clashes near Turkish border.

Link to Article - Photos - Video:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... -ISIS.html

Anthea: As stated earlier:

Her death - reported on several sites including 9News.com - however, is unconfirmed and at the time of writing the YPG (People's Defense Unit) and YPJ have yet to respond to MailOnline's request for a comment.

Let us hope and pray that this is untrue and just another attempt to demoralise the people of Kobani

[Anthea]

Reuters

Turkish official says Iraqi Kurdish fighters free to cross to Kobani

A Turkish official said on Monday Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga fighters were free to move through Turkey to Syria "as soon as they are ready" after a Syrian Kurdish leader accused Ankara of stalling on an agreement to allow them passage to the besieged Syrian border town of Kobani.

Saleh Moslem, co-chair of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), told Reuters on Monday that the peshmerga had been ready to go into Kurdish-defended Kobani for three days.

"But we don't know what is going on between them and Turkey. The delay is because of Turkey," said Moslem, whose party's armed wing, the YPG, has been battling Islamic State militants in Kobani for a month.

Turkey has been reluctant to join the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State, an al-Qaeda offshoot. But after pressure from its Western allies, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said last Wednesday that some peshmerga fighters from Iraq would be allowed to transit through Turkey to Kobani.

A Turkish official, speaking on condition of anonymity, denied Ankara was blocking the peshmerga, saying Turkey had given its consent in principle and talks were continuing.

Later on Monday the same official said the peshmerga had the green light to proceed.

"It's not true what Moslem says. As soon as the peshmerga are ready they can go. Turkey has given its consent. " he said, adding he was unsure when the transfer would take place.

The Iraqi Kurdish region's parliament voted last week to deploy some of its peshmerga forces, who have been fighting their own battle against Islamic State in northern Iraq, to Syria.

They will not engage in direct combat in Kobani but provide artillery support, a Kurdish government spokesman said on Sunday.

"They should have arrived yesterday. Until now it seems Turkey is making some difficulty," Moslem said by telephone.

Iraqi Kurdish officials cited technical issues for the delay but gave no further details.

(Reporting by Oliver Holmes in Beirut, Isabel Coles in Arbil and Jonny Hogg in Ankara; Editing by Ralph Boulton)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/ ... KI20141027

[Anthea]

Reuters

Assad's warnings start to ring true in Turkey
By Samia Nakhoul

When Sunni rebels rose up against Syria's Bashar al-Assad in 2011, Turkey reclassified its protégé as a pariah, expecting him to lose power within months and join the autocrats of Egypt, Libya, Tunisia and Yemen on the scrap heap of the "Arab Spring".

Assad, in contrast, shielded diplomatically by Russia and with military and financial support from Iran and its Shi’ite allies in Lebanon's Hezbollah, warned that the fires of Syria’s sectarian war would burn its neighbors.

For Turkey, despite the confidence of Tayyip Erdogan, elected this summer to the presidency after 11 years as prime minister and three straight general election victories, Assad’s warning is starting to ring uncomfortably true.

Turkey’s foreign policy is in ruins. Its once shining image as a Muslim democracy and regional power in the NATO alliance and at the doors of the European Union is badly tarnished.

Amid a backlash against political Islam across the region Erdogan is still irritating his Arab neighbors by offering himself as a Sunni Islamist champion.

The world, meanwhile, is transfixed by the desperate siege of Kobani, the Syrian Kurdish town just over Turkey’s border, under attack by extremist Sunni fighters of the Islamic State (IS) who are threatening to massacre its defenders.

Erdogan has enraged Turkey’s own Kurdish minority – about a fifth of the population and half of all Kurds across the region – by seeming to prefer that IS jihadis extend their territorial gains in Syria and Iraq rather than that Kurdish insurgents consolidate local power.

The forces holding on in Kobani are part of the Democratic Union Party (PYD), closely allied to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has fought a 30-year war against the Turkish state and is now holding peace talks with Ankara.

BIG RISKS

Meanwhile, Turkish tanks stood idly by as the unequal fight raged between the PYD and IS, while Erdogan said both groups were "terrorists" and Kobani would soon fall. It was a public relations disaster.

It drew criticism from NATO allies in the US-led coalition, which has bombed jihadi positions around the town in coordination with the PYD. It also prompted Kurdish riots across south-east Turkey resulting in more than 40 dead.

At the same time, Turkey's air force bombed PKK positions near the Iraqi border for the first time in two years, calling into question the 2013 ceasefire declared by Abdullah Ocalan, the jailed PKK leader. PKK commanders warned that if Turkey let Kobani fall, they would go back to war.

Yet now that the United States has dropped arms to Kobani’s defenders, Erdogan has been forced to relent and open a Turkish corridor for Peshmerga fighters from Iraq to reinforce Kobani.

Turkish officials fear this will provoke reprisals in Turkey by IS, activating networks it built during the two years the Erdogan government allowed jihadi volunteers to cross its territory to fight in Syria. Almost anything Turkey does now comes with big risks.

POLARIZED NATION

The polarization within Turkey along sectarian and ethnic lines - which analysts say Erdogan has courted with his stridently Sunni tone as communal conflict between Sunni and Shi'ite rages to Turkey’s south - is easy to detect in the poor and deeply conservative district of Fatih in Istanbul.

“I prefer to have IS than PKK in control of Kobani,” says Sitki, a shopkeeper. “They are Muslims and we are Muslims. (But) we as Muslims should be ruled by the Koran under Sharia law."

Another local shopkeeper, Nurullah, 35, broadly agreed:

“The only mistake the government has made is to open the door to Kurdish refugees. PYD and PKK are the same, both terrorists. How do (the Americans) have the nerve to ask us to help PYD?”

“Of course Islamic State has sympathizers here because they are wiping out the PKK,” Nurullah continued.

Nearby, a bearded Arabic-speaking man who declined to be named said it made sense that “Turkey as a Sunni nation supports IS over the crusaders”, a hostile reference to the US-led coalition against IS of which Turkey looks an unwilling party.

ZERO NEIGHBORS

The increasingly overt Sunni alignment of Erdogan’s Turkey is, paradoxically, contributing to its isolation, at a time when the United States has won the support of the Sunni Arab powers, led by Saudi Arabia, in the campaign against IS.

Partly, that is because Erdogan and his new prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu, who as foreign minister was the architect of Turkey’s eastward turn away from the EU, continue to champion the pan-Islamic Muslim Brotherhood, ousted in Egypt last year and banned across the Gulf.

But it is also because of Ankara’s ambivalence towards IS, which some in Turkey’s government saw as a bulwark against its three main regional adversaries: the Assad regime, the Shi'ite-led government in Iraq, and the Kurds.

“Their policy is making Turkey look completely isolated”, says Hugh Pope of the International Crisis Group.

Yet there is a wide consensus that Erdogan and his Islamist Justice and Development Party (AKP) tried and failed to take a leadership role as the turmoil of the Arab Spring swept across the region and have ended up by infecting Turkey’s secular republic with the sectarianism plaguing the Levant.

"From a zero problems policy (with neighbors) to zero neighbors,” said a headline in the leftist Evrensel newspaper in reference to the AKP policy of entente with neighboring states.

IS FIGHTING TURKEY'S ENEMIES

Behlul Ozkan, a political scientist at Istanbul’s Marmara University, says the Erdogan government has supported Islamist movements in the Middle East to establish a sphere of influence and play a leadership role.

“When the Arab Spring started, Davutoglu saw it as an opportunity for his imperial fantasy of establishing the Ikhwan (Muslim Brotherhood) belt from Tunisia to Gaza.

"They are obsessed with destroying the Assad regime. They see IS as an opportunity for Turkey since it is fighting its enemies on three fronts: against Baghdad’s Shi’ite-dominated leadership, against Assad, and the PYD, which is an affiliate of the PKK.”

Soli Ozel, a prominent academic and commentator, said the Erdogan government's initial expectation was that the Muslim Brotherhood would come to power in Syria.

“Turkish officials believed a year and a half ago they could control the jihadis but they played with fire. This was a policy of sectarianism and they got into something ... they couldn’t control, and that is why we are here”.

Other commentators and Turkish officials say Western and Arab powers that called for Assad to be toppled but refused to give mainstream Syrian rebels the weapons to do it are to blame for the rise of Jihadis in the resulting vacuum.

“They (Turkish officials) bet on Assad to fall and when they lost, instead of backing off they are doubling down,” says Hakan Altinay of the Brookings Institution. “They are not the only culprits. The international community is also a culprit in this affair”.

CAUGHT BETWEEN TWO FIRES

But uppermost among Ankara’s fears is the prospect that Syrian Kurds led by the PYD -- newly legitimized by their alliance with the United States -- will establish a new Kurdish entity on Turkey’s frontiers, which will incite Turkey's Kurds to seek self government.

“In the realpolitik of all this, IS is fighting all the enemies of Turkey -- the Assad regime, Iraqi Shi'ites and the Kurds -- but the spillover effect is that it is now paying the price in terms of its vulnerability on the Kurdish question,” says Kadri Gursel, a prominent liberal columnist.

Cengiz Candar, veteran columnist and expert on the Kurdish issue adds: “If Syrian Kurds are successful and establish self-rule they will set a precedent and a model for Turkey’s Kurds, and more than 50 percent of Kurds in the world live here”.

Turkey is thus caught between two fires: the possibility of the PKK-led Kurdish insurgency inside Turkey reviving because of Ankara’s policy towards the Syrian Kurds; and the risk that a more robust policy against IS will provoke reprisal attacks that could be damage its economy and the tourist industry that provides Turkey with around a tenth of its income.

Internationally, one veteran Turkish diplomat fears, IS “is acting as a catalyst legitimizing support for an independent Kurdish state not just in Syria but in Turkey” at a time when leading powers have started to question Turkey’s ideological and security affiliations with the West.

(Additional reporting by Ece Toksabay in Istanbul; Editing by Giles Elgood)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/ ... JI20141027

[Anthea]

CNN

Iraqi Peshmerga to enter Kobani 'today or tomorrow' to fight ISIS
Nick Paton Walsh

Kurdish fighters from Iraq will enter the besieged Syrian border city Kobani "today or tomorrow" to reinforce militia there defending against ISIS, a Peshmerga general told CNN on Tuesday.

"The Peshmerga have been ready for a few days, then had logistical problems, but they no longer do," Brig. Gen. Halgurd Hikmat said. "They will possibly be leaving today or tomorrow."

He added that "we now have an agreement with Turkey on this."

Turkish officials were not immediately available to comment.

Hikmat would not confirm how the Kurdish fighters from Iraq would join the Kurdish defenders in Kobani, but said they would bring weapons and would participate in the fighting.

The weapons would be Saddam Hussein-era gear collected in Iraq, not new coalition armaments, Hikmat added.

http://edition.cnn.com/2014/10/28/world ... ?hpt=hp_t2

[Anthea]

World Bulletin/News Desk

Peshmerga to be airlifted to Turkey to enter Kobani

A peshmerga spokesperson says Kurdish forces will enter Kobani after arriving in Turkey by air

Peshmerga forces, the Kurdish Regional Government's militia in Iraq, will be airlifted to Turkey and then cross the border to enter the besieged Syrian town of Kobani to fight ISIL militants, a Kurdish official said.

"Peshmerga forces have two ways to reach Kobani: by air and by land," Halgurt Hikmet, spokesman for the Ministry for Peshemerga Affairs, told the Anadolu Agency on Tuesday.

The spokesman said long negotiations were held as to the route for transportation of heavy arms via ground, and that all plans and programs were completed for the crossing of the border.

"All preparations are complete and the peshmerga will leave as soon as possible to help defend Kobani," Hikmet said.

Several Kurdish sources who spoke to the Anadolu Agency, on condition of anonymity, said Peshmerga forces would fly from the capital of northern Iraq, Erbil, to the southeastern province of Sanliurfa and then cross over into Kobani.

Kobani, also known as Ayn al-Arab, has witnessed fierce clashes between Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant militants and armed Kurdish groups since mid-September as well as airstrikes by a U.S.-led coalition since early August.

The spokesman denied allegations that peshmerga forces would just train Kurdish fighters and provide logistical assistance in Kobani, saying his forces would also fight against ISIL militants.

Hikmet also praised the Turkish government for its efforts which he said would provide secure and problem-free access to the town. "Turkey helped us too much," he added.

The regional government's parliament unanimously voted on Wednesday last week to send peshmerga forces via Turkey to the besieged Syrian town of Kobani to fight against ISIL militants.

The town is currently being defended by the People’s Protection Units, the armed wing of the Democratic Union Party, which is listed by Turkey as a terrorist group.

The vote at the regional parliament came two days after Turkey said it would help peshmerga forces access Kobani through Turkish territory.

http://www.worldbulletin.net/news/14721 ... ter-kobani

[Anthea]

YPG Female soldiers

phpBB [video]

[Anthea]

Reuters

Only Syrian opposition and peshmerga can save Kobani: Turkish PM
(Reporting by Ece Toksabay, Writing by Jonny Hogg, Editing by Nick Tattersall and Angus MacSwan)

Turkey cannot be expected to send troops to defend the besieged Syrian border town of Kobani and only Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga fighters and Syria's own moderate opposition can save it, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said.

U.S. warplanes have been bombing Islamic State positions near Kobani for weeks, but air strikes alone will not be enough to repel the insurgents, Davutoglu said.

"Saving Kobani, retaking Kobani and some area around Kobani from ISIS, there's a need for a military operation," he said in an interview with the BBC broadcast on Tuesday.

But made clear neither Turkey nor Western allies would commit troops.

"If they (international coalition) don't want to send their ground troops, how can they expect Turkey to send Turkish ground troops with the same risks on our border," Davutoglu said.

Kobani, on Turkey's southeastern border, has been encircled by Islamic State fighters for more than a month, and the battle to save it has become a test of the U.S.-led coalition's strategy for halting the radical Sunni Muslim group's advance.

Turkish officials have rebuffed international criticism over their reluctance to do more to help Kobani's beleaguered Kurdish defenders, whom they say are linked to the militant Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has fought a decades long insurgency against the Turkish state.

After pressure from Western allies, Turkey last week agreed to let peshmerga forces from Iraq cross its territory to reach Kobani as its preferred alternative to U.S. planes air-dropping weapons to Kurdish fighters in the town.

On Monday a Turkish official denied accusations from a Syrian Kurdish leader that Ankara was stalling on the deal, saying the peshmerga could cross "as soon as they are ready".

"The only way to help Kobani since other countries don't want to use ground troops, is sending some peace oriented or moderate troops to Kobani. What are they? Peshmerga ... and Free Syrian Army (Syrian opposition forces)."

No coalition allies have publicly called on Turkey to intervene militarily but images of Turkish troops standing by as Islamic State advanced just across the border have drawn criticism.

Turkey has repeatedly called for a long-term strategic plan for Syria involving the removal of President Bashar al-Assad from power, fearing that Assad's forces or Kurdish militants will fill the void if Islamic State is pushed back.

Davutoglu renewed calls on the United States to train and arm fighters from the Free Syrian Army (FSA), a loose coalition of groups who have been battling Assad and who have long been supported by Turkey.

"Equip and train the Free Syrian Army so that if ISIS (Islamic State) leaves, the regime should not come, so that if ISIS leaves, PKK terrorists should not come," he said.

"We will help any forces, any coalition, through air bases (within Turkey) or through other means if we have a common understanding to have a new pluralistic, democratic Syria."

Washington has committed to arming the Syrian opposition to fight Islamic State, but officials remain concerned about identifying effective, moderate groups in the increasingly bloody and radicalised conflict.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/ ... XC20141028

Anthea: Kobani would not be besieged if Turkish tanks had crossed the border and chased them away - the Islamic State would never have stayed there to confront the might of the turkish army

[Anthea]

FOX News

Iraqi Kurdish forces heading to Kobani as British hostage purportedly claims battle 'is nearly over'

Dozens of Iraq's Kurdish peshmerga fighters are flying to Turkey on Tuesday and will head across the border to fight the Islamic State for control of Kobani, in a battle in which a British hostage purportedly says “is nearly over.”

A man who identifies himself as John Cantlie, who was captured by ISIS in 2012, says in a new video -- purportedly shot in Kobani -- that militants in the contested Syrian border city are “mopping up now,” according to the BBC.

"Now the battle for Kobani is coming to an end,” the man in the video says, shown walking outside as if he was a war reporter. “The mujahideen are just mopping up now, street to street, and building to building.”

The video lasts nearly six minutes and contains footage claimed to be shot by an Islamic State drone. Sources in the Kurdish People's Protection Unit confirmed to the BBC that ISIS has drones and said the video appeared to be shot inside Kobani.

"Contrary to what the Western media would have you believe, it is not an all-out battle here now,” the man says. “It is nearly over. As you can hear, it is very quiet, just the occasional gunfire."

A British Foreign Office spokesman on Monday said the government is “aware of a further video and we are analyzing its contents.”

The Islamic State launched its offensive on Kobani and nearby villages in mid-September in battles that have killed more than 800 people, according to activists who spoke to The Associated Press.

The extremists captured dozens of Kurdish villages around Kobani and now also control parts of the town. The battles also made more than 200,000 people flee for safety across the border into Turkey.

An AP reporter on the Turkish side of the border facing Kobani said there were three airstrikes by the U.S.-led coalition on Tuesday. Occasional shooting could be heard from the town.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that the U.S.-led coalition carried out three airstrikes on Kobani in Tuesday, adding that they targeted a gathering of Islamic State fighters.

U.S. and allied aircraft also conducted airstrikes in Iraq – near the Mosul Dam, Fallujah, Sinjar and Haditha, according to Reuters.

A spokesman for the Kurdish force said Tuesday that dozens of Iraq's Kurdish peshmerga fighters will help fellow Kurds fight militants in Kobani.

According to the spokesman, Halgurd Hekmat, the peshmerga fighters will leave the city of Irbil, in Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region, later in the day. He gave no further details.

Last week, the local Iraqi Kurdish government authorized the peshmerga forces to go to neighboring Syria and help fellow Kurds combat Islamic State militants in Kobani. A total of 150 peshmerga fighters were authorized to go to Kobani through Turkey.

Lt. Gen. Frederick Hodges, the outgoing commander of NATO's Land Command in Izmir, Turkey, said last week that the Turks have agreed to open up "a land bridge of sorts" so that the peshmerga can get into Kobani to help with the fighting there.

The Turkish government has been reluctant to aid the Syrian Kurdish forces — the People's Protection Units, or YPG — because it views them as an extension of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, which has waged a 30-year insurgency in Turkey and is designated a terrorist group by the U.S. and NATO. The stance has riled Kurdish leaders and frustrated Washington.

On Tuesday afternoon, a large peshmerga convoy with heavy weapons was seen in Irbil, driving towards the Iraqi Kurdish area of Dohuk.

The convoy was moving by land and it was not immediately clear if the fighters had left or would leave on a plane and the convoy would drive to Turkey.

Idriss Nassan, a Kurdish official from Kobani, told The Associated Press that they have no confirmation that peshmerga fighters were to arrive Tuesday. "We have no information other than what we are reading on social media or hearing on the news," Nassan said by telephone from Turkey.

He added that the peshmeraga command might have direct contact with the Syrian Kurdish force known as the Peoples' Protection Units, or YPG, and for that reason Kurdish politicians in Syria are not aware of the movement.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/10/28 ... or-kobani/

[Anthea]

Reuters

Syria welcomes Peshmerga deployment in Kobane

The Syrian government welcomed on Tuesday the deployment of Peshmerga forces to the besieged town of Kobane, describing it as “a patriotic move.”

“IS is the enemy of humanity and everyone else and we see sending the Peshmerga to Kobane positive,” Syrian National Reconciliation Minister, Ali Haidar told Rudaw. “The Kurds need to support their brethren.”

Haidar said that Damascus welcomes “any act that will lead to the destruction of the Islamic State.”

Meanwhile, Kurdistan’s Peshmerga minister said forces sent to Kobane today will operate under the direct command of his ministry and that he is confident they will triumph in their mission.

Minister Mustafa Sayid Qader told Rudaw that a unit of 150 Peshmergas who left the Kurdistan Region on Tuesday to join the Kurdish defenders of Kobane “are well trained and armed with advanced weapons.”

The unit will provide heavy weapons cover, including artillery, to fighters of the Peoples Protection Units (YPG) who have been holding out in the predominantly Kurdish town for more than 40 days with air support from US-led coalition warplanes.

Qader said that the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has coordinated the Peshmerga deployment with Turkey, the United States and Kurdish authorities in Kobane.

http://rudaw.net/english/middleeast/syria/281020143

[Anthea]

[Anthea]

Reuters

Iraqi peshmerga fighters head for Syria to fight Islamic State
By Isabel Coles and Dasha Afanasieva

Iraqi peshmerga fighters headed for the Syrian town of Kobani on Tuesday to help fellow Kurds repel an Islamic State advance that has defied U.S.-led air strikes and become an important test of the coalition's ability to combat the Sunni insurgents.

Kobani, nestled on the border with Turkey, has been besieged by Islamic State for more than a month. Weeks of air strikes on the insurgents' positions and the deaths of hundreds of their fighters have failed to break the siege.

Islamic State has caused international alarm by capturing large expanses of Iraq and Syria, declaring an Islamic "caliphate" erasing borders between the two and slaughtering or driving away Shi'ite Muslims, Christians and other communities who do not share their ultra-radical brand of Sunni Islam.

The Islamic State (IS) has threatened to massacre Kobani's defenders in an assault which has sent almost 200,000 Syrian Kurds fleeing to Turkey, and triggered a call to arms from Kurds across the region.

Hemin Hawrami, a senior official in the Kurdistan Democratic Party in Iraq, wrote on his Twitter feed that peshmerga combatants were flying from Arbil airport in northern Iraq to Turkey, from where they would travel overland to Kobani.

Saleh Moslem, co-chair of the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), said later that around 150 peshmerga had entered Turkey from Iraq and were expected to reach the area of Kobani later on Tuesday night.

A Kurdish television channel showed footage of what it said was a convoy of peshmerga vehicles in northern Iraq loaded with weapons and on their way to the besieged town.

"We welcome the deployment of peshmerga fighters and weapons from the Kurdistan Region to Kobani, which began this evening," Brett McGurk, a deputy envoy tasked by U.S. President Barack Obama with building a coalition against IS, said on Twitter.

The Iraqi Kurdish region's parliament voted last week to deploy some peshmerga to Syria although a Kurdish government spokesman later said they would not engage in direct combat in Kobani but rather provide artillery support.

Kurdistan's Minister of Peshmerga, Mustafa Sayyid Qader, told local media on Tuesday that no limits had been set to how long the forces would remain in Kobani.

The fighting around Kobani has exacerbated the flow of refugees from Syria's 3 1/2-year civil war, with more than three million people already sheltering in neighbouring countries including Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey.

Jordan's foreign minister warned on Tuesday the huge demand for housing, schools, jobs and health care generated by the refugees meant Syria's neighbours were reaching the limits of their ability to cope.

GROUND TROOPS

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said earlier that air strikes alone would not be enough to push back the insurgents and that only the peshmerga and moderate Syrian rebel forces could oust Islamic State from Kobani.

"Saving Kobani, retaking Kobani and some area around Kobani from ISIS, there's a need for a military operation," he said in an interview with the BBC broadcast on Tuesday. But he made clear neither Turkey nor Western allies would commit troops.

"If they (international coalition) don't want to send their ground troops, how can they expect Turkey to send Turkish ground troops with the same risks on our border?" Davutoglu said.

Turkish officials have rebuffed international criticism over their reluctance to do more to help Kobani's beleaguered Kurdish defenders, whom they accuse of being linked to the militant Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has fought a decades-long insurgency against the Turkish state.

That stance has enraged Turkey’s own Kurdish minority – about a fifth of the population and half of all Kurds across the region. Kurds suspect Ankara would rather see Islamic State jihadists extend their territorial gains than allow Kurdish insurgents to consolidate local power.

Turkey has repeatedly called for a long-term strategic plan for Syria involving the removal of President Bashar al-Assad from power, fearing that Assad's forces or Kurdish militants will fill the void if Islamic State is neutralised.

Iran accused Turkey on Tuesday of prolonging the three-year armed conflict in Syria by insisting on Assad's overthrow and supporting "terrorist groups" in Syria.

After pressure from Western allies, Turkey last week agreed to let peshmerga forces from Iraq traverse its territory to reach Kobani as its preferred alternative to U.S. planes air-dropping weapons to Kurdish fighters in the town.

"The only way to help Kobani, since other countries don't want to use ground troops, is sending some peace-oriented or moderate troops to Kobani. What are they? Peshmerga ... and Free Syrian Army (Syrian opposition forces)," Davutoglu said.

Davutoglu renewed calls for the United States to train and arm fighters from the Free Syrian Army (FSA), a loose, disorganised coalition of groups who have been battling Assad and who have long been supported by Turkey.

Washington has committed to arming the Syrian opposition to fight Islamic State, but U.S. officials remain concerned about identifying effective, moderate groups in the increasingly sectarian Syrian conflagration.

(Additional reporting by Stephen Brown in Berlin, Ece Toksabay in Istanbul, Jonny Hogg in Ankara; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/10/2 ... me=topNews

[Anthea]

Turkey was pressurised into allowing peshmerga through

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