US ground troops to Iraq, Syria: Pentagon
Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said in a statement to Congress that the US will begin ground operations against ISIS forces in Iraq and Syria.
Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said in a statement to Congress that the US will begin ground operations against ISIS forces in Iraq and Syria.
Turkish military forces attacked Kurdish positions on the Syrian border, raising fears that Turkey is moving to establish its "buffer zone."
A Kurdish lawyer in Turkey will face trial for comments he made about the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), saying the group is not a terrorist organization but a political movement.
A new coalition of 13 armed organizations announced the formation of the Democratic Forces of Syria, which is now planning a major offensive against ISIS.
Several PKK sympathizers have been arrested in connection with the Ankara suicide blasts—but the Turkish left charges that the ruling AKP collaborated with ISIS in the attack.
The US and Russia each groom their own rival proxy forces to fight ISIS and the Nusra Front—which in turn pledge to turn Syria into "another Afghanistan."
Amnesty International accuses Syrian Kurdish forces of ethnic cleansing against Arabs and Turks in areas liberated from ISIS, raising pressure on Kurdish authorities for an accounting.
Kurdish and Turkish activists are continuing to demand "peace despite everything" after twin suicide blasts at an Ankara anti-war rally killed at least 100 and injured twice as many.
With tensions high between Turkey and Russia, Moscow's intervention risks drawing the Kurds into the geopolitical game and escalating divisions within the Syrian resistance.
With the Rojava Kurds mounting an offensive on the last ISIS-held border town in northern Syria, Turkey has launched a new propaganda push to brand them as "terrorists."
With much of Turkey's east under a state of emergency and pro-government mobs sacking offices of the left-opposition HDP, Kurdish leaders charge a campaign of "political genocide."
ISIS fighters seized the last oil-field still under the control of the Assad regime after several days of fighting. The Jazal field has a production capacity of 2,500 barrels per day.