Artillery fire from Turkey and coalition air strikes killed 23 Islamic State militants in northern Syria, broadcaster Haberturk reported on Monday.
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Washington and some other Western countries that have called on Assad to step down accuse Russian Federation of focusing mostly on strikes against the moderate so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA), and less on attacking hardline Islamic State militants.
It did not say when the operation was carried out.
The monitor said that extremist militants won back three villages south of the besieged city in a surprise assault against fighters from the US -backed Syria Democratic Forces, in which at least 28 SDF fighters were reportedly killed.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Daesh had dispatched a small group of extremists – including one driving an explosives-laden auto – into villages southeast of their bastion of Manbij.
The villages had been seized in recent weeks by the USA -backed Syrian Democratic Forces in their push for Manbij.
More than 40 people were also wounded in the attack on the Sheikh Maqsoud area, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, a district next to the only way in and out of rebel-held parts of the northern city, the Castello road.
“Daesh executed residents”, he added, using an Arabic acronym for Islamic State.
“We saw (SDF) fighters behind our house, digging to station their snipers, we thought they were Daesh (Islamic State) fighters, who were still inside the village”, she said.
Manbij has been under intense attacks by SDF forces on the ground and coalition fighter jets from the air for more than two weeks.
Held by the extremists since 2014, Manbij was a key stop along Daesh’s supply route from the Turkish border southeast through the town of Tabaqa and on to its de facto Syrian capital of Raqqa.
On Monday, the Observatory said, a failed Islamic State counterattack against regime fighters southwest of Tabqa killed at least 14 jihadis and six government loyalists.
The monitor, which tracks violence across the country, said the militants had sent reinforcements and cited at least 300 fighters heading to Tabqa from Raqqa.
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Hundreds of people have been killed in Aleppo since peace talks broke off in April, as President Assad seeks to regain control of what was Syria’s largest pre-war city, now split between rebel and government sectors.
