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U.S. Supports Turkish conquest of Jarablus
US military helps out as Turkey takes fight to IS-held Syrian town [IsraelTimes] American air cover, intelligence and advisers help Turkish forces roll into Islamic State stronghold of Jarablus, as pro-Ankara Syrian rebels seize village of Keklijah. The United States is providing Turkey’s military with air cover, intelligence and advisers in its offensive against the Islamic State (IS) group inside Syria, a senior US official said on Wednesday. “We want to help the Turks get ISIL off the border” between the two countries, the official told reporters, using an alternative acronym for the IS group. US advisers are communicating with the Turkish military about a plan to take the Syrian border town of Jarablus, a key IS stronghold that is a primary objective of the Turkish offensive, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. The United States is “syncing up with them, our advisers are in the planning cell with them,” he said. “We’ll have close air support if there’s an operation” in Jarablus. Taking Jarablus and IS-held town of al-Bab to the south would be a significant step toward linking up border areas under Kurdish control on both sides of the Euphrates. Washington is also helping ensure that Kurdish fighters further south do not provoke a conflict with Turkish forces by moving north toward Jarablus, said the official, who was traveling with US Vice President Joe Biden. Biden arrived in Turkey on Wednesday for meetings with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Prime Minister Binali Yildirim, in an effort to help improve relations strained by Turkey’s coup d’etat attempt last month. The Turkish operation — named “Euphrates Shield” — began early Wednesday with Turkish artillery pounding dozens of IS group targets around Jarablus, according to the Turkish prime minister’s office. Turkish tanks and special forces accompanied by pro-Ankara Syrian rebels then rolled across the border in an unprecedented operation to drive the IS group out of the town from which it has fired rockets into Turkey. Pro-Ankara Syrian rebels took the village of Keklijah three miles (five kilometers) west of Jarablus and two miles from the border, Turkish state media said, in the operation’s first reported military success. The United States has made it clear to the Syrian Democratic Forces, a US-backed Kurdish and Arab alliance, that “we don’t and won’t support them going north, and they can’t without our air cover, so we’ve put a lid on them moving north,” the official went on. “I think we’ve put a lid on the Turks’ biggest concern (which) gives us breathing space to make sure the Jarablus operation is done the right way.” Pictures of the fighting showed fighters facing little resistance as they rolled into Jarablus, amid reports that the city was quickly taken over. But Wednesday’s dual-purpose operation puts Turkey on track for a confrontation with the US-backed Kurdish fighters in Syria, the most effective fighting force against IS in the area. Turkey is concerned about the growing clout of the group, which it says is linked to Kurdish groups waging an insurgency in southeastern Turkey. A senior official with Syria’s largest Kurdish group suggested Turkey will pay the price. Saleh Muslim, the co-president of the Democratic Union Party or PYD, tweeted that “Turkey is in Syrian Quagmire. Will be defeated as Daesh” will be. He used the Arabic language acronym for IS. The Syrian government condemned Wednesday’s Turkish incursion into the Islamic State group-held border district of Jarablus as a “flagrant violation” of its sovereignty. The foreign ministry said it “condemns the crossing of the Turkey-Syria border by Turkish tanks and armoured vehicles towards the town of Jarablus with air cover from the US-led coalition and considers it a flagrant violation of Syrian sovereignty. The Syrian opposition in exile, however, welcomed the intervention. “Syria demands the end of this aggression,” the foreign ministry said. “Any party conducting a battle against terrorism on Syrian soil must do so in coordination with the Syrian government and the Syrian army who have been fighting this war for five years. “Chasing out IS and replacing them with terrorist groups backed by Turkey is not fighting terrorism.” In sharp contrast, the Istanbul-based opposition National Coalition hailed the Turkish intervention and stressed that rebel forces were doing the fighting on the ground. It issued a statement welcoming “the support of Turkey and the international coalition for the military operation in Jarablus,” in which “the rebels are carrying out the combat operations.”
Ankara-backed Syria rebels: Jarablus 'liberated' [AlArabiya] In an operation backed by Turkish shelling, Syrian rebels said on Wednesday that Jarablus in northern Syria on the Turkish border has been "libeated" from ISIS bad boy group. "Jarablus is completely liberated," Ahmad Othman, commander of the Sultan Mourad rebel group, told AFP from the scene, while another rebel front man said ISIS fighters had fled towards Al-Bab, to the southwest. Earlier, a rebel commander with the Failaq al-Sham group, who requested anonymity, told Rooters that most of ISIS fighters in Jarablus had pulled out, some of them surrendering. Another commander estimated up to 50 percent of the town was now under the control of the Turkish-backed rebels. "ISIS (ISIS) fighters have withdrawn from several villages on the outskirts of Jarablus and are heading south towards the city of al Bab," the Failaq al Sham commander said. That'd be al-Bab, where the force that liberated Manbij is headed.
The Turkish Armed Forces began its cross-border “Euphrates Shield” operation early on Aug. 24 with aerial strikes and ground forces backed by strikes from rocket launchers, howitzers and tanks. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan vowed that the operation targeted “terrorist organizations such as Daesh [the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant - ISIL] and the PYD [Democratic Union Party].” “We are determined to protect the territorial integrity of Syria and provide that this country is ruled under the will of its own people, using our opportunities, including directly handling the matter,” Erdoğan said while addressing a meeting in Ankara on Aug. 24. The preparation for the operation started on Aug. 23 when Turkish Special Forces entered Syria briefly for marking key spots, Hürriyet has learned. A second group of special forces accompanied the tanks when they rolled into Syrian soil. Twenty tanks and nearly 20 armored vehicles advanced toward Jarablus in the operation, aiming to secure control over a 70-kilometer region. Syrian rebels entered Syria from Turkey using a corridor opened by Turkish artillery fire. At least 14 ISIL militants were killed in the operation, according to initial reports. In a bid to prevent any friendly-fire causalities, the Turkmen groups fighting against ISIL wore blue arm bands while the Free Syrian Army (FSA) members wore red ones. FSA fighters captured a total of four villages namely, Keklice, Kıvırcık, Elvaniye and Güğüncük, Doğan News Agency reported. An unconfirmed video showed Syrian rebels walking in central Jerablus. Sources reported that Turkish tanks in Syrian territory blocked ISIL’s support routes, while Turkish F-16s and coalition jets pounded ISIL vehicles headed from the al-Bab region to support ISIL militants fighting in the Jarablus area. Some 5,000 FSA fighters, including groups from the Sultan Murat Brigade, Sukur al-Jeber, the Sham Front and Feylek al-Sham, reportedly advanced toward central Jarablus. The mines planted by ISIL were removed as some trapped bombs were found in villages abandoned by the militants. The operation marked the first time warplanes from Turkey had struck in Syria since November, when Ankara downed a Russian warplane near the border, and the first significant incursion by Turkish special forces since a brief operation to relocate the tomb of Suleyman Shah,
Posted by: trailing wife 2016-08-25 |
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