Islamic State casualties in the Syrian city of Kobani are mounting in a war of attrition with Kurdish fighters, according to a rights monitor and analysts.
More than 1,150 people, including at least 712 members of Islamic State, have been killed in clashes there over the past two months, the U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in a statement. The tally could not be independently verified.
Bolstered by the arrival this month of better-armed Kurdish forces from Iraq, known as peshmerga, and sustained aerial bombing of Islamic State by the U.S., Kobani's defenders have repelled militant advances and accomplished some "minor achievements" along the city's northern and western fronts, said Rami Abdurrahman, SOHR's head.
Islamic State "thought Kobani would fall at a minimal human cost and with minor effort," he said by phone. "But it has become an area of attrition for them."
Kurdish forces killed three Islamic State commanders during the latest fighting in Kobani, Turkey's official Anadolu news agency reported Sunday, citing a Kurdish military official. The U.S. military said the same day that it has carried out nine airstrikes around Kobani since Nov. 14, destroying several Islamic State fighting positions and staging areas.
The al-Qaida breakaway group began its offensive on Kobani in mid-September as it sought to add territory to a self-styled caliphate covering swaths of Syria and northern Iraq. As it neared the city, tens of thousands of residents fled across the nearby border to Turkey.
Even with losses to its "manpower and firepower," Islamic State probably remains a potent force around Kobani, said Oytun Orhan, an analyst at the Center for Middle Eastern Strategic Studies in Ankara. "It can quickly recruit in areas under its control and benefits from fighting against the U.S. and its allies in Kobani to draw support of extremists from around the world."
A spokesman for Kurdish forces, Soras Hassan, said from Kobani that Islamic State has been able to replace militants killed with recruits from neighboring Arab villages and towns.
"The war has been somewhat balanced after the arrival of the peshmergas and other forces," Hassan said by phone. "We've been able to stop their advance and have started to gain ground in hand-to-hand clashes."
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