Tag Archives: Raqqa

U.S.-backed forces seize Raqqa ruins; U.N. sees ‘dire’ situation

Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters gather near Raqqa city, Syria June 7, 2017. REUTERS/Rodi Said

By Lisa Barrington

BEIRUT (Reuters) – U.S.-backed Syrian forces aiming to oust Islamic State from its Syrian stronghold Raqqa captured a ruined fortress on the edge of the city on Wednesday and a U.S. coalition official said the attack was set to accelerate.

The U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which includes Arab and Kurdish militias, on Tuesday declared the start of its offensive to seize the northern Syrian city from Islamic State, which overran it in 2014.

With tens of thousands of people uprooted by the fighting, a U.N. official warned of a dire humanitarian situation, with shortages of food and fuel. The YPG militia, which is part of the SDF, called for international humanitarian aid.

“We are receiving reports of air strikes in several locations in Raqqa city,” U.N. aid official Linda Tom told Reuters by phone from Damascus.

By Wednesday, the SDF had moved into the western outskirts of Raqqa and were trying to advance into an eastern neighborhood. Shelling and air strikes from the U.S.-led coalition hit targets around the city’s edges, according to a war monitoring group and the YPG.

West of Raqqa, the SDF cleared Hawi Hawa village and took the more than 1,000-year-old Harqalah fortress ruins, YPG militia spokesman Nouri Mahmoud told Reuters by phone.

To the east, there were clashes in the al-Mishlab district, the first quarter the SDF entered on Tuesday, Mahmoud and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said.

The Raqqa assault overlaps with the final stages of the U.S.-backed attack to recapture Islamic State’s capital in Iraq, the city of Mosul.

Brett McGurk, the American envoy to the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State, said it was significant that the SDF now had a “foothold” in Raqqa.

The Islamists are “down to their last neighborhood in Mosul and they have already now lost part of Raqqa. The Raqqa campaign from here will only accelerate,” McGurk said in Baghdad on Wednesday.

But he said the coalition and SDF were prepared for “a difficult and a long-term battle”.

Islamic State has been forced into retreat across much of Syria. Its biggest remaining foothold is in the eastern province of Deir al-Zor, which borders Iraq.

PEOPLE ON THE MOVE

The U.N.’s Tom said an estimated 50,000-100,000 people were trapped inside Raqqa, far fewer than its population before the Syrian war erupted in 2011. Many have fled to camps elsewhere in Syria.

In some areas around Raqqa, where the SDF has recently taken control, people had started returning home, said Tom, but yet more were still being uprooted and the situation was very fluid.

YPG spokesman Nouri Mahmoud told Reuters displaced people were coming from all edges of the city after finding their own routes out.

He said when refugees arrived at SDF positions they were being given tents and upplies, but much more humanitarian support was needed to cope with the large numbers.

“Their situation is tragic, it is difficult. There isn’t much support for them,” Mahmoud said.

McGurk said the coalition was working with the SDF on a humanitarian response.

Now in its seventh year, the Syrian conflict has killed hundreds of thousands of people and driven more than 11 million people from their homes.

(Reporting by Lisa Barrington in Beirut and Ahmed Rasheed in Baghdad; Writing by Lisa Barrington; Editing by Tom Perry and Andrew Roche)

U.S.-backed Syrian force launches battle to capture Raqqa from Islamic State

Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) spokesman Talal Silo speaks during a press conference in Hukoumiya village in Raqqa, Syria June 6, 2017.REUTERS/Rodi Said

By Rodi Said and Tom Perry

HUKOUMIYA, Syria/BEIRUT (Reuters) – The U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said on Tuesday it had launched a battle to capture Raqqa, Islamic State’s de facto Syrian capital, piling pressure on the jihadists whose self-declared caliphate is in retreat across Syria and Iraq.

SDF spokesman Talal Silo told Reuters the operation started on Monday and the fighting would be “fierce because Daesh (Islamic State) will die to defend their so-called capital”.

The assault overlaps with the final stages of the U.S.-backed attack to recapture the Iraqi city of Mosul from Islamic State. It follows months of advances to the north, east and west of Raqqa by the SDF, which includes Arab and Kurdish militias.

Islamic State captured Raqqa from rebel groups in 2014 and has used it as an operations base to plan attacks in the West. Silo said the assault had begun from the north, east and west of the city, which is bordered to the south by the River Euphrates.

The commander of the Raqqa campaign, Rojda Felat, told Reuters SDF fighters were attacking the al-Mishlab district at the city’s southeastern outskirts, confirming an earlier report by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

“The coalition has a big role in the success of the operations. In addition to warplanes, there are coalition forces working side by side with the SDF,” Silo said by phone from the Hukoumiya farms area, 10 km (6 miles) north of Raqqa, where the SDF later declared the start of the assault.

A Reuters witness at the location could hear the sound of heavy shelling and air strikes in the distance.

An Arab group in the SDF, the Syrian Elite Forces, which was established in February, had entered al-Mishlab with coalition air support, its spokesman Mohammed al-Shaker said by phone.

“The Syrian Elite Forces one or two hours ago entered the first quarter of Raqqa, which is al-Mishlab quarter, via the eastern front,” he said.

The U.S.-led coalition said the fight for Raqqa would be “long and difficult” but would deliver a “decisive blow to the idea of ISIS (Islamic State) as a physical caliphate”.

“It’s hard to convince new recruits that ISIS is a winning cause when they just lost their twin ‘capitals’ in both Iraq and Syria,” a coalition statement cited Lt. Gen Steve Townsend, the coalition commanding general, as saying.

“We all saw the heinous attack in Manchester, England,” said Townsend. “ISIS threatens all of our nations, not just Iraq and Syria, but in our own homelands as well. This cannot stand.”

“Once ISIS is defeated in both Mosul and (Raqqa), there will still be a lot of hard fighting ahead,” he said.

Security officials in the West have warned of increased threat of attacks such as last month’s Manchester suicide bombing and Saturday’s attack in London as Islamic State loses ground in Syria and Iraq. Both attacks were claimed by Islamic State.

AIR STRIKES

The Observatory said the SDF had captured some buildings in the al-Mishlab area, and that Islamic State fighters had withdrawn from parts of the district. The Observatory also said an attack was underway against a military barracks, Division 17, on the northern outskirts of Raqqa.

The U.S.-led coalition has said 3,000-4,000 Islamic State fighters are thought to be holed up in Raqqa city, where they have erected defenses against the anticipated assault. The city is about 90 km (56 miles) from the border with Turkey.

The SDF includes the powerful Kurdish YPG militia.

Fighting around Raqqa since late last year has displaced tens of thousands of people, with many flooding camps in the area and others stranded in the desert.

The U.N. human rights office has raised concerns about increasing reports of civilian deaths as air strikes escalate.

The Raqqa campaign has “resulted in massive civilian casualties, displacement and serious infrastructure destruction” so far, it said in a May report. Islamic State militants have also reportedly been preventing civilians from leaving, it said.

The U.S.-led coalition says it tries to avoid civilian casualties in its bombing runs in Syria and Iraq and investigates any allegations.

The Raqqa campaign has been the source of tension between the United States and Turkey, which fears growing Kurdish influence in northern Syria and has lobbied Washington to abandon its Kurdish YPG allies.

The YPG has been the main partner for the United States in its campaign against Islamic State in Syria, where the group is also being fought in separate campaigns waged by the Russian-backed Syrian government and Free Syrian Army rebel groups.

The United States last week said it had started distributing arms to the YPG to help take Raqqa.

The SDF has said it will hand control of Raqqa to a civilian council from the city after its capture, echoing the pattern in other areas the SDF took from Islamic State.

Speaking alongside Silo at the news conference, an official with the Raqqa civilian council said it would take control of the city from the “liberating forces”.

The SDF and YPG control a swathe of northeastern Syria from the Iraqi border to the city of Manbij on the western banks of the Euphrates. The main Kurdish groups and their allies have established autonomous administration in the areas under their control, which they aim to preserve in any peace deal.

(Reporting by Rodi Said in Syria, Tom Perry and Ellen Francis in Beirut; Additional reporting by Mahmoud Mourad in Cairo; Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

Kurdish YPG says ‘major operation’ on Syria’s Raqqa to start in days

FILE PHOTO: Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters hold up their weapons in the north of Raqqa city, Syria February 3, 2017. Picture taken February 3, 2017. REUTERS/Rodi Said/File Photo

By Tom Perry

BEIRUT (Reuters) – A U.S.-backed operation by Syrian forces to capture Islamic State’s Syrian “capital” of Raqqa will start in the next “few days”, the spokesman for the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia said on Saturday.

The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an alliance of Kurdish and Arab militias backed by the U.S.-led coalition, has been encircling Raqqa since November in a multi-phased campaign to drive Islamic State from the city where it has planned attacks on the West.

The assault on Raqqa will pile more pressure on Islamic State’s self-declared “caliphate” with the group facing defeat in the Iraqi city of Mosul and being forced into retreat across much of Syria, where Deir al-Zor is its last major foothold.

“The forces reached the outskirts of the city, and the major operation will start … in the coming few days,” YPG spokesman Nouri Mahmoud told Reuters by phone.

He was confirming a report citing the spokeswoman for the Raqqa campaign, Jihan Sheikh Ahmed, as indicating a new phase to storm Raqqa would start in the “coming few days”. The remarks made in an interview with a local media outlet were circulated by an SDF-run Whatsapp group.

A spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State said it would not comment on the timeline for the next phase of operations to retake the Syrian city, located on the River Euphrates some 90 km (56 miles) from the Turkish border.

The spokesman, Colonel Ryan Dillon, said the SDF were “advancing closer and closer every day”, having moved to within 3 km (less than two miles) of Raqqa to the north and east.

To the west, the SDF were less than 10 km (six miles) away, he said in an email interview.

The United States said on Tuesday it had started distributing arms to the YPG to help take Raqqa, part of a plan that has angered NATO-ally Turkey, which is worried by growing Kurdish influence in northern Syria.

Turkey views the YPG as the Syrian extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, which has fought an insurgency in southeast Turkey since 1984 and is considered a terrorist group by the United States, Turkey and Europe.

The U.S.-led coalition has said some 3,000 to 4,000 Islamic State fighters are thought to be holed up in Raqqa city, where they have erected defenses against the anticipated assault.

The U.S.-led coalition has provided air support and special forces to help the SDF operations near Raqqa.

“The battle will not be easy,” Mahmoud said. “Of course (IS) has tunnels, mines, car bombs, suicide bombers, and at the same time it is using civilians as human shields.”

Once Raqqa falls, Deir al-Zor province in eastern Syria will be Islamic State’s last major foothold in Syria and Iraq.

“Daesh will resist because Raqqa is its capital and if Raqqa goes that means the entire caliphate is gone,” Mahmoud said.

(Reporting by Tom Perry; Editing by Helen Popper)

Dozens of fleeing civilians killed, wounded by Islamic State mortar fire in Mosul

A displaced Iraqi woman who fled her home, carries a mattress in al-Zanjili neighbourhood, north of Old City district of Mosul, Iraq.

By Ahmed Rasheed

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – At least seven civilians were killed and 23 wounded by Islamic State mortar shells as they tried to flee Mosul’s militant-controlled Zanjili district on Thursday, Iraqi police said.

Zanjili is part of the enclave that remains in the hands of Islamic State in the northern Iraqi city, alongside the Old City centre and the Medical City hospitals complex.

U.S.-backed Iraqi government forces retook eastern Mosul in January and began a new push on Saturday to capture the enclave where about 200,000 people are trapped, regularly dropping leaflets telling families to flee.

The wounded from Zanjili were taken to a field clinic, a police officer told Reuters, adding that more people could have been killed while trying to flee. They were part of the first group of civilians who have managed to escape.

Several dozen other civilians managed to reach government-held lines unhurt, using the same exit route, the officer said.

The population in the Islamic State-held enclave live in harrowing conditions, running low on food, water and medicine, and with limited access to hospitals, the United Nations said on Sunday.

MILITANTS MOVE PRISONERS

The militants began moving their prisoners out of the Medical City district as Iraqi forces advanced on them, two residents speaking by phone said, asking not to be identified.

Islamic State used basements in the Medical City as jails for former army and police officers and also people violating a code of conduct which forbids such activities as selling cigarettes and smoking.

The militants ordered dozens of families living in Zanjili district to move into the Old City to prevent them escaping toward the Iraqi forces, a resident told Reuters on Wednesday.

The Mosul offensive, now in its eighth month, has taken much longer than expected, with Iraqi government advances slowed by the need to avoid civilian casualties.

An Iraqi Federal Police member fires an RPG towards Islamic State militants during a battle in western Mosul.

An Iraqi Federal Police member fires an RPG towards Islamic State militants during a battle in western Mosul. REUTERS/Alaa Al-Marjani

The fall of the city would, in effect, mark the end of the Iraqi half of the ”caliphate” declared in 2014 over parts of Iraq and Syria by Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, in speech from a historic mosque in Mosul’s old city.

In Syria, Kurdish forces backed by U.S.-air strikes are besieging Islamic State forces in the city of Raqqa, the militants’ de facto capital in that country.

The militants have been countering the offensive with suicide car and motorbike bombs, snipers, booby-traps and mortar fire.

About 700,000 people, about a third of the pre-war city’s population, have already fled, seeking refuge either with friends and relatives or in camps.

Displaced Iraqi people carry their belongings as they flee from western Mosul, Iraq May 31, 2017.

Displaced Iraqi people carry their belongings as they flee from western Mosul, Iraq May 31, 2017. REUTERS/Alkis Konstantinidis

(Reporting by Ahmed Rasheed; Writing by Maher Chmaytelli; Editing by Ralph Boulton)

Syrian force urges Raqqa jihadists to surrender by end-May

FILE PHOTO: A Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighter inspects a damaged building inside Tabqa military airport after taking control of it from Islamic State fighters, west of Raqqa city, Syria April 9, 2017. REUTERS/Rodi Said/File Photo

BEIRUT (Reuters) – A U.S.-backed alliance of Syrian militias promised on Thursday that no harm would come to Islamic State fighters in Raqqa who turned themselves in by the end of the month, calling on them to lay down their arms ahead of an expected assault on the city.

The Syrian Democratic Forces, which groups Kurdish and Arab fighters, has advanced to within a few kilometers (miles) of Raqqa city at the nearest point, in an offensive that got underway in November to encircle and capture the city.

The SDF, which includes the powerful Kurdish YPG militia, said earlier this month it expects to launch the final assault on Raqqa in early summer. YPG and SDF officials had previously given April start dates for the assault, but these slipped.

The U.S.-led coalition has not declared any time frame for the final assault on Raqqa city, which has served as Islamic State’s de facto capital in Syria since the group declared its cross-border “caliphate” in 2014.

In a statement, the SDF said a May 15 appeal for militants to turn themselves in within 10 days had achieved “positive results”, and the deadline would now be extended until May 31 based on “requests from the noble people of Raqqa”.

The SDF said it would guarantee the lives of militants who turn themselves in regardless of their position, “paving the way for the settlement of their situation”. The safety of their families was also guaranteed, it says.

The SDF statement issued by spokeswoman Jihane Sheikh Ahmad said the extension would “allow the greatest number possible of those who were deceived or forced to join to benefit from this opportunity”.

The U.S.-led coalition says some 3,000 to 4,000 Islamic State fighters are thought to be holed up in Raqqa city where they continue to erect defenses against the anticipated assault.

The six-year-long Syrian war has allowed IS to seize swathes of Syria, where the group faces separate campaigns by the U.S.-backed SDF, the Russian-backed Syrian military, and Free Syrian Army rebels backed by the United States.

(Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Toby Chopra)

Turkey wants U.S. envoy on Islamic State removed over Kurdish policy

Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan delivers a statement to reporters alongside U.S President Donald Trump after their meeting at the White House in Washington, U.S. May 16, 2017. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

By Daren Butler and Humeyra Pamuk

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turkey said on Thursday the U.S. special envoy in the battle against Islamic State should be removed because he supported Kurdish militants, and warned that Ankara would act unilaterally if it faced attack from the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia.

The comments, which followed a White House meeting on Tuesday between President Tayyip Erdogan and U.S. President Donald Trump, reflected Turkish anger at Trump’s decision to arm YPG fighters who are part of a force aiming to recapture the Islamic State-held Syrian city of Raqqa.

Ankara regards the YPG militia as an extension of Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants fighting a decades-old insurgency in southeast Turkey, while Washington sees the YPG as its most reliable ally for the Raqqa campaign.

Turkey has long complained that U.S. policy against Islamic State in Syria has favored the YPG over Arab rebel forces, a policy that Turkish officials believe is driven partly by Washington’s envoy to the international coalition against the jihadist group.

“Brett McGurk, the USA’s special envoy in the fight against Daesh (Islamic State), is definitely and clearly giving support to the PKK and YPG. It would be beneficial if this person is changed,” Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told NTV television.

The United States and the European Union, along with Turkey, designate the PKK a terrorist organization.

Erdogan, speaking to reporters at the Turkish embassy in Washington after the talks with Trump, said he told the U.S. president that Turkey would not hesitate to strike if it faced any sort of attack from the YPG, Turkish media reported.

“We clearly told them this: if there is any sort of attack from the YPG and PYD against Turkey, we will implement the rules of engagement without asking anyone,” Sabah newspaper cited him as saying. The PYD is the YPG’s political arm.

Erdogan did not specify what measures he might order, but said Turkey had shown its fighting capabilities when Turkish forces and Syrian rebels seized territory in northern Syria last year, pushing back Islamic State fighters and prompting a limited withdrawal of the YPG militia.

“Indeed we did this in Rai, Jarablus, al-Bab. Turkey showed what it can do,” Erdogan said. “We will not give terrorist groups breathing space domestically or abroad.”

TENSIONS WITH ALLIES

Cavusoglu said Trump had understood Turkey’s position, and did not challenge Erdogan when the Turkish president set out his possible response to the YPG.

Last month, Turkish warplanes bombed Kurdish fighters in Iraq’s Sinjar region and YPG militia in Syria, drawing rebuke from Washington which voiced concern over the air strikes and said they harmed the coalition’s fight against Islamic State.

Erdogan said that the United States had made its decision on conducting the Raqqa operation – despite Ankara’s opposition – and that Turkey could not participate given the YPG involvement.

“We told them … we do not regard your cooperation with a terrorist group in Raqqa as healthy,” he was cited as saying.

But he said he expected a role for Turkey in Syria, and repeated Turkey’s assertion that once Raqqa was retaken from Islamic State, Kurdish forces could not be left in control of an Arab city. “I believe they will knock on our door on the subject of Syria,” he said.

The tensions with Washington over the YPG come as Turkey’s relations with the European Union, and Germany in particular, have also deteriorated.

Turkey has prevented German parliamentarians visiting its Incirlik airbase, where 250 German troops are based as part of a mission which includes German surveillance planes supporting the campaign against Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.

Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen said on Wednesday the German government had been evaluating possible alternatives to Incirlik and was considering moving the troops to Jordan.

(Additional reporting by David Dolan; Editing by Dominic Evans and Ralph Boulton)

U.S.-backed Syrian forces expect Raqqa assault soon, await weapons

Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) officials hold a press conference in the town of Tabqa, after capturing it from Islamic State militants this week, Syria May 12, 2017. REUTERS/Rodi Said

By Rodi Said

TABQA, Syria (Reuters) – The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said on Friday their attack to capture Raqqa city from Islamic State would begin soon and the U.S.-led coalition would supply them with weapons including armored vehicles for the assault.

The SDF, an alliance of militias including Arab groups and the Kurdish YPG militia, has been waging a campaign to isolate and ultimately capture Raqqa city since November, with backing from the U.S.-led coalition.

While the U.S.-led coalition has already supplied weapons to Arab fighters in the SDF, the White House this week authorized for the first time arming its most powerful element – the Kurdish YPG – to help in the Raqqa assault, infuriating Turkey.

SDF commander Abdul Qader Hevdeli declined to say when exactly the assault on Raqqa would begin, but said it would be soon during a news conference in the town of Tabqa, which the SDF captured this week from IS after weeks of fighting.

“I can’t specify exactly, I believe entering and storming the city will happen at the start of the summer,” he said.

“At the start of entering (Raqqa), of course, as (the U.S.-led coalition) promised us, there will be support in the form of specialized weapons, armored vehicles or others,” he said.

He said that weapons the White House has approved for the YPG had yet to arrive. “I believe these weapons or this support will arrive soon,” he said.

The capture of Tabqa and its nearby dam on the Euphrates river marked a major milestone in the SDF campaign against IS. The SDF said in a statement Tabqa would be turned over to a civilian council once fully secured.

It also said the authority that oversees the hydroelectric Tabqa dam would remain “a national Syrian institution that will serve all the regions of Syria without exception”.

(Additional reporting by Beirut bureau; Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Hugh Lawson and Richard Lough)

U.S.-backed Syria militias say Tabqa, dam captured from Islamic State

FILE PHOTO: A view shows Tabqa City as seen from the northern part of the Tabqa Dam on the Euphrates River, Syria March 28, 2017. REUTERS/Rodi Said/File Photo

By Ellen Francis

BEIRUT (Reuters) – U.S.-backed Syrian militias said they fully seized the town of Tabqa and Syria’s largest dam from Islamic State on Wednesday, a major objective as they prepare to launch an assault on Raqqa, the jihadists’ biggest urban stronghold.

The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters, have been battling the militant group for weeks in Tabqa, some 40 km (25 miles) west of Raqqa, along the Euphrates River.

With air strikes and special forces from the U.S.-led coalition, the SDF are advancing on Raqqa to ultimately take the city, which is also the Islamic State’s base of operations in Syria.

They captured Tabqa “thanks to the sacrifices of the SDF’s heroes and with the full, unlimited support of the U.S.-led international coalition”, said SDF spokesman Talal Silo.

Nasser Haj Mansour, an adviser to the SDF, said the town and the adjacent Tabqa dam were now “completely liberated” after the SDF drove all Islamic State militants out.

Brett McGurk, the U.S.’ special presidential envoy for the global coalition to counter Islamic State, confirmed on Twitter that Tabqa had been retaken.

“Confirmed: #ISIS defeated in #Tabqa Dam and Tabqa City, now in hands of Syrian Democratic Forces, led by its Syrian Arab Coalition. #SDF”, McGurk tweeted.

The Raqqa campaign appeared to have stalled around Tabqa, where the SDF made only slow progress after besieging the city. They pushed into Tabqa nearly two weeks ago, capturing most of its districts and encircling Islamic State at the dam.

The battle for Tabqa began after U.S. forces helped SDF fighters conduct an airborne landing on the southern bank of the Euphrates in late March, allowing them to gain control of an important nearby airbase.

Despite fierce objections from NATO ally Turkey, the United States this week approved supplying arms to the powerful Kurdish YPG militia, a key component of the SDF and their campaign.

Ankara strongly opposes U.S. support of the YPG, viewing it as the Syrian extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has waged a three-decade insurgency within Turkey.

But the YPG has emerged as a valuable partner for the United States in the fight against Islamic State in northern Syria. Washington maintains arming the Syrian Kurdish forces is necessary to capture Raqqa, which Islamic State has also used a hub for planning attacks abroad.

Raqqa now lies in an Islamic State enclave on the northern bank of the Euphrates, after the SDF has closed in on the city from the north, east and west in recent months.

Islamic State’s only means of crossing to its main territory south of the river is by boat after air strikes knocked the area’s bridges out of service.

The jihadist group still controls swathes of Syria’s vast eastern deserts and most of Deir al-Zor province near the border with Iraq, but it has lost tracts of its territory over the past year.

(Reporting by Ellen Francis, additional reporting by Idrees Ali; editing by Robin Pomeroy, Alison Williams and G Crosse)

U.S.-backed forces push against IS in slowed Raqqa campaign

A Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighter rests near destroyed airplane parts inside Tabqa military airport after taking control of it from Islamic State fighters, west of Raqqa city, Syria April 9, 2017. REUTERS/Rodi Said

BEIRUT (Reuters) – U.S.-backed forces fighting Islamic State in Syria took several neighborhoods from the militant group in the town of Tabqa on Friday, they said in a statement, part of a campaign to oust Islamic State from its stronghold in Raqqa city.

The multi-phased campaign against the jihadists by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an alliance made up of Syrian Kurdish and Arab fighting groups, was launched in November but has slowed in recent weeks.

Pushing down from the north, the SDF is trying to take the Islamic State-held Tabqa area and its adjacent Euphrates dam, the largest in Syria, some 40 km (25 miles) upstream of Raqqa.

SDF forces surround Tabqa town, having cut it off in late March from a swathe of Islamic State territory which runs across Syria into Iraq.

On Friday the SDF said it had pushed up into the town and taken the southern neighborhoods of Nababila and Zahra, having taken Wahab neighborhood to their south on Thursday.

In recent weeks the SDF has also squeezed Islamic State’s pocket of territory around Raqqa, which the jihadist group has used as a base to plot attacks and manage much of its self-declared caliphate since seizing the city in 2014.

The Kurdish YPG militia is the strongest unit of the SDF and is taking part in the assault on Tabqa and Raqqa, but it is seen by Turkey as an extension of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has fought a three-decade insurgency against Ankara.

On Tuesday the Turkish military conducted air strikes and cross-border shelling against YPG targets in Syria in what it said was retaliation for mortar attacks, prompting the U.S. State Department to voice concern. Sporadic clashes have continued along the border in recent days.

(Reporting by Lisa Barrington; Editing by Gareth Jones)

U.S.-backed forces push back Islamic State in Raqqa campaign – officials

Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters shoot a drone they said belonged to Islamic State fighters on the bank of the Euphrates river, west of Raqqa city, Syria April 8, 2017. REUTERS/Rodi Said

By John Davison

BEIRUT (Reuters) – U.S.-backed forces fighting Islamic State in Syria advanced to within 2 km (1 mile) of a key stronghold near the jihadist group’s de facto capital of Raqqa on Tuesday, and a counter-attack by the militants was repulsed, officials said.

The multi-phased campaign by the Syria Democratic Forces (SDF), backed by air strikes and military advisers from a U.S.-led coalition, ultimately aims to oust Islamic State from Raqqa. IS is also losing ground to U.S.-backed offensives in Iraq.

Officials have given different estimates for how long the campaign will take, and the assault on Raqqa itself appears to have been delayed, after one high-ranking military official said it would begin at the start of April.

Meanwhile the immediate goal is to capture the city of Tabqa, some 40 km (25 miles) west of Raqqa, and a nearby dam on the Euphrates river, an official for the Raqqa campaign said.

“For now, the target in front of our eyes is the city of Tabqa, and the dam,” Gharib Rasho, a media official for the campaign, told Reuters.

He said the SDF had taken control of around 60 percent of the dam, after capturing its northern entrance last month. The SDF is made up of Syrian Arab and Kurdish forces, including a large contingent from the powerful Kurdish YPG militia.

On Tuesday, SDF forces thwarted an Islamic State counter-attack near Tabqa and advanced to within 2 km of the city from the east, an SDF statement said.

Rasho said Islamic State had been trying to break a siege the SDF had imposed on Tabqa by attacking both from inside and from areas to its south which Islamic State still holds.

It is unclear how many Islamic State insurgents remain in Tabqa, but Rasho said they were “few”, based on the estimates of residents fleeing the city.

Thousands of residents have left in recent weeks, though tens of thousands are thought to remain in Tabqa.

The militants were using car bombs, mortar fire and suicide attackers – methods similar to those the jihadists have employed to defend their urban bastion of Mosul in Iraq, he said.

WEEKS OR MONTHS?

Launched in November, the SDF offensive aims initially to isolate Raqqa, Islamic State’s main urban base in Syria. Forces have advanced on the city from the north, east and west. Encircling and capturing Tabqa is a major part of the campaign as the city and dam comprise a strategic base for IS.

The focus on Tabqa does not rule out a simultaneous assault on Raqqa, campaign officials have said.

But that assault appears already to have been delayed as Islamic State resistance keeps forces busy around Tabqa.

The head of the YPG said last month the Raqqa assault would begin at the start of April, and would take no more than a few weeks. The commander of the Raqqa operation, also a YPG official, later said the offensive to capture the city would likely last several months.

U.S. coalition spokesman Colonel John Dorrian said Washington’s partners on the ground would choose when to move in on Raqqa. “Ultimately we are isolating Raqqa and we’re going to, at a time of our partner’s choosing, move in and liberate that city from Daesh (Islamic State),” he said in a statement.

“This is an important task. It’s the equivalent in Syria of what’s being done to eliminate the enemy in Mosul.”

The parallel U.S.-backed Iraqi offensive to drive Islamic State out of Mosul has also taken longer than the Iraqi government predicted. Fighting there rages on between the armed forces and jihadists who are holed up in its Old City.

(Additional reporting by Babak Dehghanpisheh in Baghdad and Ellen Francis in Beirut; Editing by Michael Georgy/Mark Heinrich)