Image: aa.com.tr
On November 24, Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) announced that 18 people were killed or wounded as a result of a series of Turkish air and artillery strikes that targeted its areas of influence in northern and northeastern Syria a day earlier.
The airstrikes targeted several positions of the SDF and Syrian government forces as well as a number of oil, gas and electric facilities.
In a statement, the SDF acknowledged that three of its fighters an security personnel were killed and six others were wounded as a result of the Turkish strikes. Two service members of the Syrian Arab Army were also wounded, along with at least seven civilians.
The Kurdish-led group didn’t provide any information about the current condition of its senior military commander, Rezan Gelo, who was targeted by a Turkish combat drone in the town of al-Qamishli in the northern al-Hasakah countryside late on November 23.
The strikes were carried out in the framework of Operation Claw-Sword, which Turkey launched on November 20 against Kurdish forces in Syria and Iraq. The operation is a response to the November 13 Istanbul bombing. Ankara blamed the deadly terrorist attack on the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), the main component of the SDF.
Turkey claims that 254 Kurdish insurgents have been neutralized and 471 positions have been struck in Syria and Iraq since the start of the operation.
Despite recent talk of a new ground operation against the SDF by Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkish strikes on northern and northeastern Syria slowed down on November 24. Pressure from Russia and the United States, the main backer of the SDF, could eventually force Ankara to abandon its military plans, once again.
The Kurds are for the birds, bomb em all to a pile of turds.