Exhausted from days of fighting, Kurdish women are leading a pincer movement against Isis at the northern end of the road that leads to the jihadists’ Syrian capital. They speak to Patrick Cockburn in Ras al-Ayn, Syria
The Kurdish soldiers relax half a mile behind the front line where they have been battling Isis forces west of the Syrian town of Ras al-Ayn. The women are in no doubt about why they are fighting.
Nujaan, who is 27 and has been a soldier for four years, says that Isis’s “target is women”. She says: “Look at Shingal [in Iraq] where they raped the women and massacred the men. It is a matter of honour to defend ourselves first, and then our families and lands.” Sitting beside her is Zenya, 22, who adds that she also “is fighting for myself and my family”.
Overhead, the drone of US aircraft is clearly audible and Nujaan reports that there have been several air strikes that morning, as well as ground fighting.
She says that several Kurdish soldiers have been killed and wounded, though she does not know the details. She adds that the YPJ Kurdish women’s militia, to which she belongs, is gradually driving Isis towards the west. She and the other women appear remote and detached from what they are saying, possibly because they are exhausted from days on the front line.
In fact, the push westwards mentioned by Nujaan is of great military and possibly political significance because the Syrian Kurdish armed forces are closing in on a crucial Isis-controlled border crossing point from Syria into Turkey at Tal Abyad. The Syrian Kurds note bitterly that Turkey has closed the crossing points into Kurdish-held territory, but has kept open those used by Isis.
But now Tal Abyad, the northern end of the road that leads straight to Raqqa, the Isis Syrian capital, is threatened by a pincer movement by Kurds advancing from both the east and west. Some are coming from the battered town of Ras al-Ayn in the main Kurdish canton of al-Jazeera and, from the west, forces are advancing from Kobani, which withstood a four-and-a-half-month Isis siege.
Read more:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/war-with-isis-meet-the-kurdish-womens-militia-fighting-for-their-families-west-of-the-syrian-town-of-ras-alayn-10274956.html
