[Al Ahram] The Islamic State...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling
Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not
reallyMoslems....
group killed 164 civilians in its offensive on the Kurdish town of Kobane, in what a monitor Friday called one of the jihadists' "worst massacres" in Syria.
The killing spree, which took place mostly inside Kobane itself, was widely seen as vengeance for a series of defeats inflicted on the jihadists by Kurdish militia in recent weeks.
At least 120 non-combatants were killed in a 24-hour rampage on Kobane, and another 26 were executed in a nearby village, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
The bullet-riddled bodies of 18 people -- including children -- were found on Friday morning in the streets of Kobane, the Britannia-based Observatory said, adding that they had been shot "at close range".
"The body of one child bore the impact of five bullets," it said.
The assault -- in which 42 IS fighters and 10 Kurds also died -- began on Thursday when three IS jacket wallahs blew up vehicles at the entrances to Kobane, a symbol of Kurdish resistance.
Women were also among civilians whose bodies were found in their homes and on the streets, the Observatory said.
"According to medical sources and Kobane residents, 120 civilians were executed by IS in their homes or killed by the group's rockets or snipers," Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.
"When they entered the town, the jihadists took up positions in buildings at the southeast and southwest entrances, firing at everything that moved."
Local journalist Mostafa Ali said there was no military dimension to the assault.
"IS doesn't want to take over the town. They just came to kill the highest number of civilians in the ugliest ways possible," he told AFP.
"Every family in Kobane lost a family member on Thursday," Kurdish activist Arin Shekhmos said.
The jihadists entered Kobane at dawn on Thursday disguised as Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) fighters, said Ali.
They took up positions in buildings in the south of the town, using civilians as "human shields".
"There are at least 70 civilians in these various neighbourhoods that have been taken hostage by IS," Ali added.
"The YPG has sent reinforcements and have encircled the buildings, but the situation is difficult. The YPG doesn't want to hurt the women and kiddies there."
More than 1,000 fleeing civilians waited on the Syrian side of the frontier with
...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire....
on Friday, carefully watched by Turkish troops and police on the other side.
Relatives who had made it across the border cried in despair, an AFP photographer reported.
Kobane was the scene of one of IS's most dramatic defeats in January when Kurdish militia backed by US-led air strikes ousted the jihadists after four months of heavy fighting.