ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Kurdish demonstrators skirmished with Turkish police on Saturday within sight of the beleaguered Syrian border town of Kobane, as its defenders prepared a last stand against advancing Islamic State fighters. Would-be volunteers trying to cross the border to join in the defence of Kobane clashed with Turkish police with orders to block their way. A Rudaw correspondent on the scene reported a number of injuries among the protestors. One protester told Rudaw : “The attempts of the Turkish government to stop us are futile, since Kobane is under a serious threat posed by the ISIS militants.” The protests came after Kurdish military leaders in Syrian Kurdistan (Rojava) called on all Kurds to join the fight against ISIS as the radical group is edging closer to Kobane. “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 ISIS’s tanks and heavy artillery. To the east, near the Syrian-Iraqi border, Kurdish Peshmerga soldiers repulsed an ISIS attack near Rabia, which the Kurds reported to have captured from the jihadists earlier this week. A Peshmerga source said the militants had made a surprise attack on a new Peshmerga checkpoint west of the Iraqi border town. “We killed a number of militants and left their bodies,” the source said. “Fortunately, we did not have any casualties.” Elsewhere in Iraq, government forces suffered a setback when ISIS retook the centre of Hit, a town on the Euphrates in Anbar province. Falih Aisawi, deputy to the Anbar governing council, told Rudaw: “After three days of fighting between Iraqi forces and ISIS militants in the district of Hit, we evacuated the centre because of the perilous situation.” He added: “The military and security forces attempted to retake the control, but due to the advanced and heavy weapons being used by the militants, they were able to deploy in the sub-district of Kubaisia.” However, he said operations against ISIS militants would continue until they were defeated. ISIS militants had earlier attacked Hit with car bombs, heavy weapons and sniper fire. “After occupying Falluja and much of Anbar, due to the weakness of Iraqi forces, ISIS are on their way to controlling all the districts and sub-districts of Anbar,” Ghazal Fadawi , a member of the Anbar governorate council told Rudaw. Further north, the Peshmerga reported clashes with ISIS outside Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city, which the militants seized when they swept through the region in June. Clashes took place on Saturday morning near the village of Saheji, where a Peshmerga source said three ISIS militants were captured and four killed. A number of Toyota vehicles and Humvees were also disabled. There was no official word of Peshmerga casualties. On social media, ISIS published photographs of Arab tribal leaders who were said to be supporting the movement. One leader was quoted as saying the tribes were ready to fight foreigners who had come to wipe out Islam and were committed to standing together with ISIS to confront the U.S. and its allies. The propaganda effort may have been a deliberate response to reports that a powerful Arab tribe had cooperated with the Peshmerga in the operations to reclaim Rabia.
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