The Kurdish YPG militia fighting in northern Syria claimed on Sunday on its Twitter account that “tens of civilians” were “massacred” in Turkish air and artillery attacks on Bir Al-Kusa, a Syrian village near the Turkish border, in the fifth day of Ankara’s cross-border campaign that aims to target ISIS and Kurdish militants.
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The Observatory, a Britain-based monitoring group with a network of sources in Syria, said Turkish-allied forces had seized two villages south of Jarablus, Jub Al Kousa and Al Amarna, that were held by militias loyal to the SDF.
Turkey sees the Kurdish YPG in Syria as an extension of the local Kurdish guerrilla group the PKK, which has been leading an insurgency in Turkey since late 1970s in demand of Kurdish rights and increased local authority in Kurdish regions.
There was no immediate comment from Turkish officials.
The Turkish army’s operation in Syria was aimed at giving people, who fled the IS-controlled areas, a chance to return home, Erdogan told a rally of his supporters in the Turkey’s Gaziantep province, Xinhua news agency reported. We are equally resolute regarding Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD).
On Thursday, the Turkish-backed FSA gained full control of Jarabulus after the launch of air and ground assault as part of the cross-border campaign by the Turkish armed forces supported by United States led coalition airstrikes a day earlier.
Other Turkish users shared images they say prove Turkey attacked vehicles and weapons used by Kurdish militants, not civilians.
Turkey said the dead were 25 “terrorists” from the YPG and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), state-run Anadolu news agency said. “That will likely increase tension”.
The observatory said the bombardment targeted an area south of Jarabulus, a former Isis stronghold, which Turkish-led forces captured on the first day of the offensive, code named “Euphrates Shield”.
Ankara said Sunday that it killed 25 Kurdish fighters, including from SDF during air strikes near Jarablus.
Various factions of the Turkey-backed Syrian rebels said they had seized several villages and towns from Kurdish-led forces south of Jarablus, including Amarneh, where fighting was fiercest in recent days.
On Sunday, Turkish forces ramped up their offensive against pro-Kurdish forces near a town wrested back from IS this week by Turkish-backed Arab rebels.
According to the reports, the Turkish soldier was killed after a rocket hit the tank in which he was traveling.
It was the first Turkish death reported in Turkey’s campaign.
Another faction fighting under the Syrian Democratic Forces banner, the Army of the Revolutionaries, demanded the US -led coalition explain the justification for the Turkish assault, and accused Turkey of supporting hardline Islamist groups, including the formerly Al-Qaeda affiliated Front for the Conquest of Syria.
The FSA field commander said eight villages within a 20 kilometer (12 mile) radius of the city, which lies on the western bank of the Euphrates River, had been taken from the People’s Protection Units (YPG), the armed wing of the PYD. Ankara also joined forces with the outlawed Syrian Muslim Brotherhood to create the expatriate opposition Syrian National Council which Erdogan meant to succeed Assad. Most fighting so far has appeared to be with rebels aligned to the Kurdish-backed SDF rather than Islamic State.
On Saturday, the last rebel fighters were evacuated from the town of Daraya just outside Damascus, under a deal that followed a brutal 4-year government siege.
Operation Euphrates Shield would split Kurdish territory in the north of the country and prevent Syria’s Kurds from creating their federal state.
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Much of the heaviest fighting this summer has focused on the second city of Aleppo, which is roughly divided between rebel forces and President Bashar al-Assad’s troops.
