Kurdish leader declares victory in key battle with ISIL

Special to WorldTribune.com

Kurdish peshmerga forces backed by U.S.-led coalition air strikes have pushed out Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL) and liberated the Iraqi town of Sinjar, Kurdish regional president Massud Barzani said on Nov. 13.

“I am here to announce the liberation of Sinjar,” Barzani told a news conference near the northern Iraq town.

Kurdish peshmerga fighters in Sinjar, Iraq.
Kurdish peshmerga fighters in Sinjar, Iraq.

The operation is seen as a major victory for the Kurds and the U.S.-led coalition as it cuts a key ISIL supply line that ran through Sinjar and into Syria. Sinjar was also the site where ISIL jihadists brutally massacred a number of members of the area’s Yazidi minority.

U.S. officials said the coalition carried out 36 air strikes against ISIL targets in the Sinjar area on Nov. 11-12 and 15 more across the border in Al-Hol, Syria.

The Pentagon confirmed on Nov. 12 that U.S. ground troops were advising peshmerga forces on their offensive in Sinjar and were close enough to the front to identify ISIL targets and call in air strikes.

“There are some advisers who are on Sinjar mountain, assisting in the selection of air strike targets,” Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said. “They’re not directly in the line of action, but they might be able to visibly see it.”

U.S.-led coalition officials said peshmerga troops on Nov. 12 took a key highway that connects ISIL-held areas in Iraq and Syria.

“Sinjar sits astride Highway 47, which is a key and critical resupply route” for ISIL, said Colonel Steve Warren, spokesman for the international operation.

“By seizing Sinjar, we’ll be able to cut that line of communication, which we believe will constrict (ISIL’s) ability to resupply themselves, and is a critical first step in the eventual liberation of Mosul.”

During a visit to Tunisia on Nov. 13, Secretary of State John Kerry said the U.S. was “absolutely confident that over the next days Sinjar will be able to be liberated.”

Peshmerga commander Khalaf Murad Atto said ISIL suicide bombers may still be hiding in Sinjar and a fighter for the Yazidis, who joined the battle to liberate the town, said ISIL snipers and bombs remained a threat.

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