U.S. Airstrikes Target Islamic State Fighting Kurds in Syria
A building and two armed vehicles belonging to the al-Qaeda breakaway group were destroyed near the Syrian town of Kobani, the U.S. Central Command said yesterday. At least three militants were killed, according to the U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors developments in the country’s civil war.
“Airstrikes by the international coalition are a positive development, but they just bombed a few places,” said Orhan Sansal, the Kurdish mayor of Suruc, which lies across the border from Kobani in Turkey. “Islamic militants have even come closer to Kobani,” he said by telephone today.
Expanding the coalition’s airstrikes to Kobani may offer reprieve to Kurdish fighters defending the town, also known as Ayn al-Arab. Islamic State’s onslaught on the territory this month forced thousands to flee across the border into Turkey.
Islamists Thrive
The U.S. has been attacking Islamic State targets in Iraq since August. It widened its military offensive against the group into Syria this month with the help of the U.A.E., Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Bahrain and Qatar. The coalition is the biggest U.S.-Arab military venture since the 1991 war to liberate Kuwait from Iraqi occupation.
Islamist militants are thriving in the Middle East from Iraq to Syria and Libya, taking advantage of a decline in state authority and one of the world’s highest youth-unemployment rates to recruit young fighters.
“Beating this organization isn’t as easy as many may expect,” Dubai’s ruler, Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, wrote in an editorial published today in several local newspapers. While the coalition can defeat Islamic State militarily, the fight requires “open, enlightened thought” to counter its ideology, he said.
Airstrikes in Syria also targeted oil refineries in the northern area of Tal Abyad, the observatory said today. The U.S. says Islamic State uses the modular facilities in its oil-smuggling operations.
Bloomberg
