ERBIL, Kurdistan Region—Kurdish military leaders in Syrian Kurdistan (Rojava) have called on all Kurds to join the fight against the Islamic State (IS) as the radical group is edging closer to the city of Kobane near the Turkish border. “Our call to all the young men and women of Kurdistan is to come to be part of this resistance,” said a statement from the Peoples Protection Units (YPG). Kobane is being defend by a few thousand YPG men and women carrying light weapons against IS’s tanks and heavy artillery. “Every street and house will be a grave for them (IS),” vowed the YPG statement. Residents of Kobane who fled the advancing IS militants two weeks ago are now watching their city under IS shelling only meters away on the Turkish border. On Friday the Canadian government said it would send fighter jets to take part in air strikes against the Islamist militants in Iraq. US jets have also bombed IS positions in Syria, but largely avoided the besieged Kurdish city. “We are in a small, besieged area,” Esmat al-Sheikh, head of the Kobane defense force told Reuters. “No reinforcements reached us and the borders are closed.” According to al-Sheikh, the distance between his fighters and the insurgents was now half a mile. “My expectation is for general killing, massacres and destruction,” Reuters quoted al-Sheikh saying. On Thursday the Turkish parliament authorized the army to take action against the approaching IS militants just south of their border, but so far congregating Turkish soldiers backed by tanks and artillery remain inactive on the border. “We wouldn't want Kobani to fall,” Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told the media. “We'll do whatever we can to prevent this from happening.” Kurdish leaders in Syria urge the international community to act against the IS in Rojava, but they reject Turkey’s call for a no-fly-zone. More than 150,000 people from Kobane and surrounding villages have fled since the IS invasion on the area two weeks ago and they have taken refuge inside Turkey. Supported by Western air power Kurdish Peshmerga forces in Iraqi Kurdistan have pushed back IS militants and retaken many villages and strategic towns. Syrian Kurds however, feel abandoned by the international community while fighting the same radical group. “My son is over there, he crossed through a minefield to get there. He is just 14,” Remzi Savas, 53, a Kobane resident told Reuters on the Turkish border. “There are many children fighting for the YPG, we can't hold them back. They think they'll lose everything if Kobani falls.”
