Turkish Troops, Syria Rebels Enter Kurdish Stronghold in Syria

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Turkish-led forces began a street-by-street fight to capture the most important Kurdish-held town in northern Syria early Sunday, CNN-Turk television said, a crucial juncture in Turkey’s two-month-old campaign to expel U.
-backed Kurdish fighters from the border area.
Propelled by powerful allies, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has managed to reassert control over a large part of his country after seven years of war.
But the direct intervention of Turkey, which backed anti-Assad groups through much of the conflict, suggests the war is entering a dangerous new phase amid growing tensions among regional power-players including Russia, the U.
, Iran and Israel.
military has said Turkey’s offensive was slowing down the fight against Islamic State elsewhere in Syria as some senior leaders of Kurdish forces had turned their attention from that battle toward Afrin.
Turkish authorities view the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia, which the U.
backs, as an extension of Turkey’s Kurdish PKK militants who have sought autonomy for decades.
They want to push them from their border.
Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowed on Thursday that the army would not leave Afrin “before the job is done,” and has signaled he could broaden the offensive into northeastern Syria, ultimately targeting PKK bases in Iraq to quash Kurdish aspirations for self-rule.
Turkish commandos have been fighting PKK militants in northern Iraq since last week, state-run TRT television reported Sunday.
Afrin is thought to have been heavily fortified with concrete tunnels and explosives, and while many civilians have fled, tens of thousands could be caught in a prolonged battle.
“The capture of Afrin would inflict a serious blow on the Kurds’ statehood ambitions along Turkey’s borders in Syria,” said Ali Serdar Erdurmaz, an analyst with the Hasan Kalyoncu University based in Gaziantep province, bordering Syria.
He said a Turkish victory in Afrin could prompt Erdogan to push the U.
to ensure that Kurdish fighters withdraw from the town of Manbij, to east of the Euphrates River.
The Turkish army denied on Saturday allegations that it was behind an airstrike on a hospital in Afrin that killed at least 10 people, distributing drone footage it said showed the hospital intact several hours after it was said to be attacked.
Turkey insists it is taking care to avoid civilian casualties.
Turkish troops have left a safe corridor from Afrin to allow civilians to leave the town if they want to.
Who’s Fighting and Why in What’s Left of Syria’s War: QuickTake As the original battles in Syria’s civil war draw to an end, with government forces pummeling the few remaining rebel-held areas and Islamic State on the retreat, new fronts like Afrin have opened up as local, regional and global powers try to stake out positions for the post-war period.
Armed groups loyal to Assad last month moved to join the Kurdish defense of Afrin but stayed outside the town after Turkish forces fired artillery in a warning not to advance further, state-run Turkish media reported.
If victorious, Turkey has said it will not transfer control of Afrin to the Assad government.
The entire Afrin enclave, now largely under Turkish forces, should be run by its local population, Ibrahim Kalin, spokesman for Erdogan, told TRT television on Thursday.

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