The Kurds now claim to have wrested control of about seventy percent of Kobani from the self-styled Islamic State, but heavy fighting continues for the Syrian town.

Smoke from the intense street fighting and artillery bombardment hangs over the ruined buildings and can be seen clearly from the nearby Turkish border.

The siege maintained on the city by ISIL for the past several months is now effectively broken and the militants are pulling back, but frontline reports suggest their morale is undimmed and air power is doing nothing to scale back their ambitions.

In interviews mostly made available on social media which cannot be verified, fighters express their enthusiasm for extending Sharia law and dying as martyrs for their cause. They also claimed better conditions at the frontline than their rear bases, especially more food.

Hundreds of Islamic State fighters launched an assault on the town over three months ago, so giving up ground won with so much blood must be hard, but none of the interviewed fighters showed impatience or defeatism.

euronews