Air strikes widen, intensify
The US-led coalition widened its air strikes against the so called Islamic State group in Syria yesterday as British warplanes took off for anti-jihadist missions over neighbouring Iraq.
The targets in Syria were said to include ISIS fighters around the besieged Kurdish town of Ain al-Arab, also known as Kobane, which the militants have been battling to capture.
The jihadist advance on the town has sent 160,000 refugees streaming into Turkey.
The coalition also hit IS in the central province of Homs for the first time, as well as in Minbej, near the western limit of the group's control, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Meanwhile, Royal Air Force Tornado GR4 combat jets armed with laser-guided bombs took off from Britain's RAF Akrotiri base on Cyprus for missions over Iraq.
Earlier Belgium and Denmark also approved plans to join France and the Netherlands in carrying out air raids against the militants in Iraq, allowing Washington to focus on the more complex operation in Syria, where ISIS is based.
Washington warned that the jihadists could not be defeated in Syria by air power alone, saying that up to 15,000 "moderate" rebels would also need to be trained.
Saturday was the second time US-led air strikes had been reported around Ain al-Arab since the ISIS advance began.
The sound of the fighting was clearly audible from the Turkish side of the border, an AFP photographer reported.
Hundreds more Syrian Kurdish refugees, clutching what possessions they could grab, crossed the border yesterday to find safety in Turkey, saying they were fleeing the renewed assault by IS.
Senior Syrian Kurdish official Newaf Khalil told AFP the latest strikes hit the IS-held town of Ali Shar, east of Ain al-Arab, and destroyed several IS tanks.
"We definitely welcome... the international coalition in the fight against (IS)," Khalil said via the Internet.
Yesterday's strikes came a day after hundreds of Kurdish fighters crossed from Turkey to reinforce Ain al-Arab's Kurdish militia defenders, breaking through the border fence with Turkish security forces apparently turning a blind eye.
The coalition also pounded the Euphrates valley city of Raqa, which the jihadists have made the headquarters of the "caliphate" they declared in June straddling swathes of Iraq and Syria.
"At least 31 explosions were heard in Raqa city and its surroundings," said the Britain-based Observatory, which has a large network of informants on the ground.
Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said the targets hit in Homs province, meanwhile, were in the eastern desert far from the front line in fighting involving forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad who control Homs city, Syria's third largest.
Washington has been keen not to let Assad's forces exploit the anti-IS air campaign to take the upper hand in the more than three-year-old civil war.
The US and Arab allies launched air strikes against ISIS in northern and eastern Syria on Tuesday, more than a month after Washington began its air war on the jihadists in Iraq.
A US defence official told AFP on Friday that the Syria mission is now similar to US-led air raids against ISIS in Iraq, with "near continuous" combat sorties.
Washington is also planning to train and arm 5,000 Syrian rebels as part of the effort, although the top US military officer, General Martin Dempsey, said between 12,000 and 15,000 men would be required to recapture "lost territory" in eastern Syria.
Dempsey said defeating IS would take more than air strikes and that "a ground component" was an important aspect of the US-led campaign.
European governments have so far ruled out launching strikes in Syria, although Britain "reserved the right" to intervene there in case of an imminent "humanitarian catastrophe".
Washington has instead been supported in its Syria campaign by Arab allies Bahrain, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
A British defence ministry spokesman said on Saturday that the RAF Tornados are "now ready to be used in an attack role as and when appropriate targets are identified" in Iraq.
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