ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Dozens of people have been killed in an ISIS dawn attack Tuesday on a security checkpoint on the Iraqi Syrian border where Syrian displaced and Iraqi refugees were waiting to cross to the nearby UN-funded camp in al-Hasakah.
At least 24 people have been killed, and another 30 injured when ISIS militants attacked Rajm Slebi checkpoint early in the morning, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported.
The observatory said some of the dead are believed to be from the ranks of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
The clashes are said to be continuing between ISIS militants and the SDF forces in Rajm Slebi, and also Ash Shaddadi area, south of Hasakah where the ISIS group also launched another attackek, the observatory added.
The local news Hawar News Agency (ANHA), close to the SDF, reported that the clashes in Rajm Slebi have stopped as the mainly-Kurdish SDF forces were able to drive out the attackers.
The bodies of 22 people including Iraqi refugees, and Syrian displaced people had been found by local authorities and humanitarian organizations, then buried near the UN-funded al-Hol camp, ANHA reported.
It added that 35 other people have been injured, and were transported to a hospital in al-Hasakah to receive treatment.
There are conflicting reports about the number of the ISIS attackers. The observatory and the local news agency say that a number of them were suicide bombers.
This comes as the SDF forces are very close to fully recapture the Syrian city of Tabqa, west of the ISIS-held Raqqa. The US-backed forces liberated nine districts on Sunday, and Monday.
The SDF spokesperson Cihan Sheikh Ahmed told the local media late on Monday that "[Monday" night is a decisive night" in their final push against the ISIS militants from the city.
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