It was the third successive day that Syrian planes had either flown over or attacked positions in the city of of Al-Hasakah held by Kurdish forces fighting against Islamist fighters and forces loyal to the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
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The flare up came as Turkey yesterday said it will take a more active role in addressing the conflict in Syria in the next six months to prevent the war-torn country being divided along ethnic lines.
Washington-The US-led coalition scrambled fighters to protect US advisers working with Kurdish forces after Syrian regime jets bombed the area, in the latest escalation of Syria’s bloody conflict, the Pentagon said.
The US quickly sent fighter jets to the area, but by the time the US planes arrived, the Syrians were withdrawing.
The Observatory said there had been no let-up in the fighting, which has left 41 people dead, 25 of them civilians, including ten children. It was unclear whether the aircraft had carried out bombing runs. A journalist in Hasakeh said on Saturday afternoon that the clashes had abated.
The regime and Kurdish forces share a common enemy in IS, but there have been tensions between them in Hasakeh.
Elite troops are training and supporting the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in the area, where rebel territory provides an eastern base for an expected advance on Isis’ de-facto capital of Raqqa.
Davis called the entire situation “very unusual” and said the Pentagon was “hard pressed” to think of another time when Syrian forces came so close to attacking the United States, even if that was not their intention.
Navy Capt. Jeff Davis said the USA has increased combat air patrols in that area and has warned Syria that America will defend coalition troops.
“We view instances that place coalition personnel at risk with the utmost seriousness and we do have the inherent right of self-defence when U.S. forces are at risk”.
USA special operations forces were based about six kilometers (nearly four miles) north of Hasakeh and reinforcements arrived Friday “from inside and outside Syria, accompanied by military helicopters”, Abdel Rahman said.
Thousands of civilians have fled the city, where electricity has been cut and bakeries shut.
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.
The encounter highlights a longstanding risk of USA involvement in Syria: the prospect that a direct attack on US forces by the Syrian government or its Russian allies could dramatically raise the stakes in the conflict for Washington and test the resolve of a White House with limited appetite for military intervention. U.S. special operations forces were based around six kilometres north of Hasakeh and reinforcements arrived Friday “from inside and outside Syria, accompanied by military helicopters”, Abdel Rahman said. The targets were linked to the former Al-Nusra Front, now Fateh Al-Sham Front, it said.
More than 290,000 people have lost their lives since Syria’s conflict erupted in March 2011, and millions have been forced to flee their homes. It was not immediately clear how many are left, if any, in northern Syria.
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The toll includes 165 civilians – among them 49 children – killed in opposition fire on the city’s government-held western districts.
