IS loses ground in Syria, Iraq, Libya

BEIRUT – U.S.-backed fighters in Syria converged from three sides on an Islamic State stronghold near the Turkish border Thursday, while Iraqi special forces pushed deeper into Fallujah, one of the last bastions of the militant group in western Iraq.

In Libya, IS militants were fleeing their stronghold of Sirte as forces loyal to a U.N.-brokered government advanced, with some fighters reportedly cutting off beards and long hair to blend in with civilians.

The anti-IS offensives pose a significant challenge to the extremist group as it tries to stave off multiple attacks across parts of Syria and Iraq, where it declared a so-called caliphate in 2014, and more recently seized territory in chaotic Libya.

If the U.S.-backed Syria Democratic Forces capture Manbij, it will be the biggest strategic defeat for IS in Syria since July 2015, when it lost the border town of Tal Abyad, a major supply route to the militants’ de facto capital of Raqqa.

Manbij, which had a prewar population of 100,000, is one of the largest IS-held urban areas in northern Aleppo province and is a waypoint on an IS supply line between Raqqa and the Turkish frontier.

In a sign of the town’s perceived significance, the SDF’s advances were accompanied by intense airstrikes from the U.S.-led coalition battling the IS militants. The U.S. Central Command said the coalition has conducted more than 105 strikes in support of the battle to liberate Manbij.

The airstrikes recalled the battle for the Kurdish town of Kobani in northern Syria. That campaign saw hundreds of U.S. airstrikes to support Kurdish forces who wrested Kobani from IS in January 2015 after four months of fighting that left the town in ruins.

Since then, members of the U.S. and French militaries have joined in to advise the anti-IS forces in northern Syria.

Syrian journalist Mustafa Bali, who visited the front lines in Manbij, told the Associated Press the extremists didn’t appear to be preparing to withdraw from the town as they had from other areas. On Wednesday, black smoke covered Manbij as militants set tires ablaze in an apparent attempt to cut visibility from coalition warplanes, he said.

“Daesh is preparing for a battle inside the city,” Bali said, using an Arabic acronym for the IS group. SDF official Nasser Haj Mansour said Wednesday about 15,000 civilians had fled.

A statement by the Military Council of the City of Manbij, which is part of the SDF, said all roads from the east, north and south have been cut. Its forces are now close enough to target IS militants inside the town, but they are holding off storming it to avoid civilian casualties, the statement added.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said SDF fighters are about 800 yards from the last main road linking Manbij with the city of Aleppo. At least 132 IS militants, 21 SDF fighters and 37 civilians have been killed since the SDF offensive began on May 31, the observatory said.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said that while the time is not yet right for new peace talks on the Syrian civil war, the failure to reach an agreement soon will probably mean an escalation in the conflict.

Ban stressed the urgency of an early August deadline set by the U.S. and Russia, co-chairs of the International Syria Support Group, for “at least the beginnings of a serious agreement.”

In Iraq, elite counterterrorism forces rolled into southern Fallujah on Wednesday under U.S.-led coalition air power, the first time in more than two years that government troops have entered the IS-held city west of Baghdad. The militant group fired back with mortars and rockets.

Fallujah is one of the last IS strongholds in Iraq, and government forces last month began a large-scale operation to recapture it. Iraqi troops have slowly won back territory, although IS still controls parts of the north and west, as well as the second-largest city of Mosul.

An online statement from the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for two suicide attacks in Iraq – one that killed 19 people and wounded 46 in a mostly Shiite neighborhood of Baghdad and another that killed 12 people and wounded 32 in the town of Taji, north of the capital. The figures were confirmed by medical officials who spoke on condition of anonymity.

U.S. State Department spokesman Mark Toner condemned the bombings as “barbaric terrorist attacks,” and he praised the “progress being made by Iraqi forces on the battlefield” in Fallujah.

In Libya, IS militants were retreating from the city of Sirte as militia fighters allied to a unity government pushed into the city in tanks and pickup trucks mounted with machine guns, according to officials and video posted on social media.

The capture of the Mediterranean coastal city capped a monthlong offensive by Libyan militias. Sirte is the only major IS-held city outside Syria and Iraq.