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Islamic State group jihadists were in control Thursday of more than one-third of the Syrian border town of Kobane after pushing back its Kurdish defenders, a monitoring group said.
“Despite fierce resistance from the Kurdish forces, IS advanced during the night and controls more than a third of Kobane,” Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told AFP.
Islamic State fighters have pushed into two districts of the strategically important Syrian border town of Kobane in fierce fighting, Kurdish officials among the town’s defenders said.
“Tonight [Islamic State] has entered two districts with heavy weapons, including tanks. Civilians may have died because there are very intense clashes,” Asya Abdullah, co-chair of the Democratic Union Party (PYD), the main Syrian Kurdish group defending the area, told Reuters from the town.
A black flag used by IS militants flies atop a building on the outskirts of Kobane. (Credit: AFP)
Officials inside the Syrian-Turkish border town of Kobane say it is in serious danger of falling to Islamic State (IS) fighters who have reportedly raised black flags on the eastern side of the town.
IS fighters have been battling Kurdish forces for control of the strategic town for almost three weeks.
At least 14Syrian-based militants and three Hezbollah fighters were killed in fierce fighting in a border area in east Lebanon Sunday after jihadists attacked positions of the Lebanese group in the area, security sources said.
Militant groups attacked Sunday two Hezbollah posts on the Syrian side of the border near the eastern Lebanon villages of Brital and Nahleh, killing three of its members and wounding a number of others, the sources told The Daily Star.
Islamist militants besieging the Syrian border city of Kobani appeared poised late Friday for a direct assault on the predominantly Kurdish enclave after a day of intense shelling.
After nightfall, at least three massive explosions, apparently from airstrikes, shook Kobani and the surrounding area, lighting up the evening sky. The blasts drew cheers from Kurdish refugees who fled the city and have been watching the fighting from hillsides on the Turkish side of the border.