Smoke billowed over the key Syrian border town of Kobane on Sunday as Kurdish fighters supported by US-led air strikes battled to hold back intensified attacks by Islamic State jehadis.
IS fighters seized part of a strategic hill overlooking the town late on Saturday, a monitor said, but their progress was slowed by new strikes from the coalition of Washington and Arab allies.
The dusty town on the Turkish border has become a crucial battleground in the international fight against IS, which sparked further outrage this weekend with the release of a video showing the beheading of Briton Alan Henning.
The video — the latest in a series of on-camera beheadings of Western hostages — included a threat to another hostage, US aid worker Peter Kassig, whose parents made an impassioned plea for his release.
Heavy fighting raged around Kobane late on Saturday as the jehadis pressed their 17-day siege of the town, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitoring group.
“IS succeeded on Saturday night in taking the southern part of the Mishtenur hill,” Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.
If the jehadis seize the hilltop, he said, “the whole town of Kobane will be in their sights and it will be easier to take.” Abdel Rahman said seven new coalition strikes against IS positions were carried out in the area late on Saturday and the strikes were hindering the jehadis’ advance.
The battle was continuing early on Sunday, with shelling echoing from Kobane — also known as Ain al-Arab — and fighter jets roaring overhead, an AFP reporter just across the border in Turkey said.
Dozens of fighters from IS have been reported killed in the latest coalition raids. The Observatory, which relies on a network of local sources, said at least 33 IS fighters and 23 of the town’s Kurdish defenders were killed on Saturday.
Meanwhile, the US military unleashed a wave of air strikes against Islamic State jehadis in Syria and Iraq this weekend, destroying tanks, armoured vehicles and mortar teams, a statement said on Sunday.
US fighter aircraft carried out three air strikes in Syria on Saturday, while fighter jets, bombers and helicopters were used in six assaults against ISIS positions in Iraq on Sunday, US Central Command said in a statement. An airstrike in Syria northwest of Al Mayadin destroyed a bulldozer, two tanks and another vehicle.