Kurds mount offensive against ISIL, gain ground in northeast Syria

Kurdish fighters have advanced on a key town in northeastern Syria which is a stronghold of the ISIL Takfiri terrorists.

According to the UK-based so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the move on Friday on the eastern and southeastern edges of the town of Tel Hamis in Hasakah Province came after the Kurdish fighters recaptured several nearby villages from the ISIL militants.

Hasakah borders Iraq and Turkey and its residents are predominantly Kurdish. It also has populations of Arabs and Assyrian Christians and Armenians.

Meanwhile, Nawaf Khalil, a spokesman for the Kurdish fighters known as the People’s Protection Units (YPG), has claimed that Kurdish forces have actually entered Tel Hamis and “totally liberated” the town, though his claim has not been confirmed by independent sources.

The Kurdish offensive against ISIL has left at least 175 militants dead, the observatory added.

The YPG forces have made several territorial achievements against the ISIL since liberating the Kurdish border town of Kobani after months of clashes with the Takfiri terrorists.

During the past week, Tel Hamis and other towns in Hasakah have been the scene of heavy fighting against ISIL terrorists, who, according to reports on February 24, kidnapped an estimated 220 Assyrian Christians from the nearby villages in Tel Tamer countryside.

Assyrians, who come from one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, have been under increasing threat by the ISIL terrorists recently.

Kurdish forces say they have cut a main ISIL supply line from Iraq over the past few days.