For the fourth consecutive day, the offensive against the last stronghold of the Islamic State (IS) group in eastern Syria is halted because the Arab-Arab forces, calling for the “capitulation” of the jihadists, fear for the fate of civilians held in the country. zone.
After their brilliant conquests in 2014 of vast territories in Syria and Iraq, the jihadists are surrounded in an area of barely half a square kilometer in Baghuz, a small town in the province of Deir Ezzor, in eastern Syria.
But for several days, the offensive of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which has the support of an international coalition led by Washington, is halted and has as a priority to preserve the civilians held in the sector and used as “human shields” by the jihadists, ensures the arabokurda alliance.
“We want to isolate the civilians to evacuate them before giving the assault,” a spokesperson for the SDS, Mustefa Bali, told AFP on Tuesday, without giving further details.
The UN expressed on Tuesday its “deep concern” for the close to “200 families, which include women and children, and which are apparently blocked in the tiny sector still controlled by the IS.”
“Apparently the IS prevents many of them from leaving,” the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, said in a statement.
In the town of Baghuz, the IS fighters only control some houses, where they are refugees in tunnels, in the middle of a sea of mines that tries to stop the advance of the SDS.
The jihadists have only two options, “surrender or die in combat,” said Mustefa Bali.
On Monday afternoon there was calm in Baghuz, where the fighting of the previous days destroyed buildings and charred cars, an AFP team said at the scene. In 2014, the IS proclaimed a “caliphate” in a territory with an area equivalent to that of the United Kingdom.
The jihadists forcibly established their own administration, in which they carried out executions and torture, and fomented attacks also abroad. But after several offensives in Syria and Iraq, their territory was totally reduced.
“The nightmare is over,” says Dino, a 26-year old FDS fighter. “We have saved people, the first battles were difficult, we did not know the enemy well, but now we know it well,” explains the young man.
Since the beginning of December, about 40,000 people, mainly jihadist families, fled the last stronghold of eastern Syria, according to the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights (OSDH).
The men suspected of belonging to the IS are in detention centers. For their part, civilians, including women and children of jihadists, are being taken to IDP camps in northern Syria.
The international aid committee said on Monday that 62 people died on the road north, a six-hour journey made in livestock transport vehicles, or upon arrival. Two-thirds of the deceased are children under one year of age.
Hundreds of foreigners detained during the battles are still being held by the Kurdish forces. US President Donald Trump recently called on European countries, very reluctant, to repatriate their citizens who are in Syria.
The battle against IS represents the main front of the war in Syria, which left more than 360,000 dead and millions of displaced and refugees since 2011.
According to the commanders of the SDS, the announcement of the victory against the ultra-radical organization will take place in the coming days. On Monday a senior official of the SDS again assured that the defeat of the jihadists is imminent.
But in addition to their last stronghold in eastern Syria, the object of the current offensive, the IS jihadists are also scattered in the Badiya desert and claim attacks carried out by “dormant cells” in regions controlled by the SDS.
