The LCC said Turkish-backed Free Syrian Army rebels captured the village of Tweiran, to the south of al-Rai, from IS on Sunday. He spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk about the Turkish troops. It has been roughly divided between government control in the west and rebel control in the east since mid-2012, but in recent months regime forces have slowly began to close in on the east.. We are also defending Syria’s territorial integrity.
Advertisement
Prime Minister Binali Yildirim on Friday told Bloomberg News that Turkey is seeking to prevent a breakup of Syria on ethnic lines with its military operations in the country. The system – created to reduce potential collateral damage as it impacts at a high angle and has a relatively small blast radius – was sacked out of southern Turkey, a United States official said.
The victory comes on the same day that Syrian forces retook parts of Aleppo just a month after losing the territory.
The advance came after Turkey launched an operation dubbed Euphrates Shield on August 24 targeting both Daesh and Syrian Kurdish militants.
Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency said 19 Syrian rebels wounded in clashes with IS since Saturday have been hospitalized in Turkey. The Observatory said three people were killed.
Daesh is an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State group. Turkey considers YPG a terrorist organization and an extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK.
Rami Abdulrahman, from the UK-based Observatory, said: “Everything is finished”.
Mr Yildirim said Turkey would never allow the formation of an artificial state in the north of Syria.
In a statement, Turkey’s armed forces said “the Jarablus-Azaz line has been connected”.
Some Kurds have criticised Turkey for its role in Syria.
However, the USA sees the YPG militia as an important strategic part of the US -led anti-IS coalition and has provided them with extensive aid and air strikes.
Above all, the border had served as the main conduit for the foreign fighters who have swarmed to participate in the militants’ ambitious experiment in Islamic governance, formalised in 2014 into what the group’s leadership termed a caliphate.
In the view of Abdullah Agar, a security analyst and writer, Turkey is now engaged in a struggle for existence against terror groups as well as the powers behind them.
With Turkey’s rapid success in less than two weeks, his position looks stronger with territory in between the two Kurdish “cantons” of Afrin and Kobane now in the hands of Ankara-backed rebels. Turkish jets supporting Syria opposition fighters also destroyed four IS targets on both of its fronts, the Turkish military said, quoted by Anadolu.
Advertisement
Also, hundreds of rebels from the Turkey-backed Sultan Murad Brigade and other Turkmen rebel factions accompanied the Turkish army in the advance towards Aleppo. “There are no civilians living there anymore”.
