Le Drian linked the battle for Raqqa with the Iraqi offensive against the IS-held city of Mosul. “There is the moderate Syrian opposition, the vetted Syrian forces and the Free Syrian Army [FSA] forces, and there is some initial outreach to forces in Raqqa proper”, he said. It has been the extremists’ de facto capital since they declared a caliphate in areas they control in Iraq and Syria in June 2014.
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In Iraq, the US -led coalition is working with the government in Baghdad, but Washington and its partners in Syria rely on a mixture of Arab and Kurdish opposition groups, some of which are bitter rivals.
In an interview with Channel 2 Israel on Sunday, Medvedev said that thousands of Russian citizens and individuals from former Soviet states are fighting with anti-government forces in Syria.
A correspondent in Ain Issa saw dozens of SDF fighters heading on vehicles towards the front line. The blasts occurred as the forces pushed south from the towns of Ain Issa and Suluk, about 30 miles north of Raqqa.
The Syrian Democratic Forces said ten villages and several hamlets had been taken from IS. IS had set off five vehicle bombs as part of their defense, he said.
“We believe the inclusion of fighters from the local population is an important advantage to the SDF”. Strategic priority is Manbij Kurtulmuş also said one of Ankara’s strategic priorities was to ensure that all PYD forces would be withdrawn from the Manbij area in northern Syria, and this concern was delivered to Dunford in meetings.
Operation “Wrath of the Euphrates” involves some 30,000 fighters and began on Saturday night, Ahmed said.
If Mosul is any indication, the battle for Raqqa will be a long and grinding one. “As in Mosul, the fight will not be easy and there is hard work ahead”, US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said in a statement after the assault was launched.
Operation “Wrath of the Euphrates” under the air cover of the US -led anti-terror coalition involves some 30,000 fighters and began on Saturday night, Ahmed said.
Brett McGurk, the United States envoy for the coalition battling the extremists, said the visit was to keep “close close contact with our Turkish allies” over the offensive.
A US-backed assault on Raqqa, Islamic State’s de facto capital in Syria, is unlikely to pierce the city itself before President Barack Obama leaves office in January, denying him the chance to claim the end of the group’s “caliphate” as part of his legacy. It lies on the west bank of the Tigris river, about 15 kilometers southeast of the edge of Mosul. In the meantime we will continue shaping operations like airstrikes against Da’esh leaders, command and control and resources.
“Resistance is very heavy and they (IS) have suffered major losses”, Staff Lieutenant General Abdelghani al-Assadi of the elite Counter-Terrorism Service told AFP.
The Mosul offensive has advanced faster than expected but the battle for Raqa is far more complicated.
The proverbial elephant in the room is Turkey, which launched its own incursion into Syria in late August and considers the Kurdish militia to be a terrorist organization. The largest and most powerful groups in the coalition are the main Kurdish militias known as the People’s Protection Units, or YPG, and the Women’s Protection Units, or YPJ. Raqqa has an estimated of 5,000 IS militants, and they could use civilians as human shields as they have done in the past and the current retake of the city of Mosul in Iraq. Turkish state media agency Anadolu was initially silent on the operations, but tweeted on Monday that “Turkey, US agree on plan to seize Raqqa” without providing further details.
A USA government official put the number at “just over 33,000 people”.
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The United Nations has warned of a possible exodus of hundreds of thousands of refugees from a city which is still home to up to 1.5 million people.
