IS has claimed a massive bomb blast that killed at least 44 people and injured dozens in Syria was payback for airstrikes against its forces.
Advertisement
Islamic State (IS) has said it was behind the attack, in Hassakeh province, near the border with Turkey. The extremist group has carried out several bombings in Kurdish areas in Syria in the past.
The bomb hit near a Kurdish military headquarters, possibly targeted because the US has backed Peshmerga fighters against ISIS in northern Syria.
Syrian state TV showed footage of people running away from a mushroom of grey smoke rising over the town and others running amid wrecked or burnt cars.
The area that was targeted houses several Kurdish administration buildings including the defence ministry and was considered a secure zone, with multiple checkpoints and security measures in place.
The city was previously the target of IS bombings, most recently in April. The explosions tore apart a security headquarters along with government ministries in what may have been Isis retaliation for a Kurdish-backed offensive that threatens to seal off the self-declared caliphate from the outside world.
The dead include civilians and members of the security forces, it says.
A second explosion minutes after the first blast, originally thought to be a motorcycle attack, appeared to come from a gas canister that caught fire by the truck, the Associated Press reported.
Many residential buildings were hit by the intense blast. Two people were slightly hurt in Nusaybin, said one witness. The recent attacks in Germany and France were claimed by the group, which had urged its supporters around the world to take the war outside of Iraq and Syria.
Advertisement
Territory that Islamic State controls in that area was a major supply route to the outside world via the Turkish-Syrian border, through which it moved weapons and fighters.
