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U.S. hits ISIS sites in northern Syria

Patrick J. Mcdonnell Los Angeles Times

BEIRUT – U.S.-led airstrikes have struck positions of the Islamic State in Syria close to the Turkish border, the Pentagon said Saturday, in what could signal an escalation of the American aerial assault against the extremist faction in Syria.

The strikes appeared to be the first time that the U.S.-led campaign in Syria had attacked militants in the northern Syrian border town of Ayn al-Arab, known as Kobani in Kurdish.

Last week, U.S. aircraft began hitting Islamic State positions across Syria, while continuing to target the group in neighboring Iraq.

In a statement, the U.S. Central Command said Saturday that aircraft destroyed an Islamic State building and two armored vehicles at the border crossing in Kobani. Kobani sits a few hundred yards south of barbed wire marking the Turkish border.

The strike was part of a series of attacks carried out across Syria on Friday and Saturday, the Central Command said.

President Barack Obama has pledged to “degrade and ultimately destroy” the Islamic State, also known by the acronyms ISIS or ISIL. In August, U.S. warplanes began airstrikes against Islamic State positions in Iraq.

Kobani has been the focus of a major battle pitting Syrian Kurdish militiamen against advancing forces of the Islamic State, an al-Qaida breakaway faction that has seized huge stretches of territory in northern Syria and Iraq. The Kurds have called for help from the international community.

It was unclear whether U.S. aerial bombardment in support of the Kurds in Kobani was the start of a larger effort to aid the ethnic minority, which has been losing ground to the better-armed Sunni Arab extremist fighters.

Overall, the Pentagon said Saturday, fighter jets and remotely piloted drone aircraft conducted seven airstrikes Friday and Saturday on Islamic State positions across Syria, including the attack in Kobani.

The forces of three Arab countries-Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the United Emirates-participated with the United States in some of the strikes, the Pentagon said without elaboration.