A small number of U.S. Special Operations forces have been working in the Hasakah area for months training and advising Kurdish elements of the Syrian Democratic Forces for the fight against ISIS, but the Syrian regime has been targeting the same group as part of the larger civil war. “This means to not allow Syria to be divided on any ethnic base, for Turkey this is crucial”, Turkish Prime Binali Yildirim said.
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The Americans made it clear that the USA would “take whatever action is necessary” to defend the special operators on the ground, Davis said.
There are 300 U.S. special forces in Syria, assisting local militias, including the YPG, in the fight against so-called Islamic State (IS).
While the YPG controls most of the northeast, the Syrian government has maintained footholds in the cities of Hasaka and Qamishli at the border with Turkey.
Navy Capt. Jeff Davis on Friday said that the US has warned Syria that America will defend coalition troops.
In its first comment on the situation, the Syrian army accused a YPG-affiliated security force known as the Asayish of igniting the violence through escalating “provocations” including the bombardment of army positions in Hasaka that had killed a number of soldiers and civilians.
If the aforementioned encounter is any indication, perhaps there won’t be any conflict between the United States and the Syrian regime.
“This is very unusual, we have not seen the regime take this type of action against YPG before”, Davis said, using the initials of the US-supported Kurdish militia fighting the Islamic State group in northern Syria. A government source in Hasakeh told AFP that the air strikes were “a message to the Kurds that they should stop this sort of demand”, after Kurds called for the dissolution of a pro-regime militia.
Thousands of civilians have fled the city.
The encounter came one day after Syrian warplanes conducted airstrikes on Kurdish positions near the city of Hasakah, not far from where USA special forces were operating. The targets were linked to the former Al-Nusra Front, now Fateh Al-Sham Front, it said.
More than 290,000 people have been killed since the conflict erupted in March 2011.
A surge in violence in Syria’s second city Aleppo has left 333 people dead since July 31, the Observatory said yesterday.
Syria’s army has blamed the YPG for the Hasaka fighting and described it as a branch of the PKK, a characterisation the group rejected on Saturday.
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In the central province of Homs, 20 civilians including at least five children died overnight in suspected regime air raids and artillery fire on a cluster of towns and villages, the Observatory said yesterday.
