MESOP FACING KOBANE : LATEST – JOE BIDEN ACCUSES ERDOGAN OF SUPPORTING IS

IS jihadists pound Syrian Kurdish Kobani town / The US military said four air strikes hit the Kobani area overnight.

October 5, 2014 – AFP – MURSITPINAR, Turkey’s Kurdish region,— Kurdish YPG fighters supported by US-led air strikes held back jihadists attacking a Syrian border town Saturday, following an international outcry at the murder of a British hostage by the Islamic State group.

Dozens of militants with the Islamic State (IS) organisation — which has seized large parts of Syria and Iraq — were reported killed in the latest coalition air raids. The dusty Kurdish town of Kobani in Syrian Kurdistan on the frontier with Turkey has become a key battleground between IS jihadists and their opponents, who include local Kurdish fighters as well as the United States and its allies. The US military said four air strikes hit the Kobani area overnight.

Fighting raged Saturday as IS militants attempted to seize a strategic hilltop that would give them access to the town, activists said. Mortar rounds pounded the town as smoke rose above it, according to an AFP team on the Turkish side of the border. “The resistance is continuing. The danger has not yet been overcome,” Sebahat Tuncel, a Kurdish member of Turkey’s parliament, told reporters after visiting Kobani. Five jihadists were killed in American air raids near the town, as well as 30 more around Shadadi in northeastern Syria, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.IS militants fired at least 80 mortar rounds into Kobani, also known as Ain al-Arab, on Friday.

The fighting killed at least 10 Kurdish militia members, according to the Britain-based Observatory, which monitors the conflict. But activist Mustafa Ebdi said Kurdish fighters had been buoyed by their success at holding off the assault so far, noting that the jihadists had hoped to capture the town by Saturday for the Muslim Eid al-Adha festival. “So far they have failed to enter the town,” Ebdi said.

American bombers and fighter jets also carried out five air strikes against IS in Iraq, the US military said. On Thursday, Turkey’s parliament voted to allow the deployment of forces in Syria and Iraq to fight IS. Ankara also warned it would not hesitate to strike IS jihadists if they attacked Turkish troops in Syria stationed at an enclave holding the tomb of Suleyman Shah. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan angrily rejected comments by US Vice President Joe Biden that Turkey and others in the region had financed and armed jihadist organisations in Syria.