Operation Featherweight: Month 4, Week 4, Day 3.

As I mentioned at the time the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) yesterday launched a fresh assault on the city of Kobane/Ayn al-Arab which sits just 1km (0.6 miles) from Syria's border with Turkey. This appears to have been primarily a propaganda stunt but also an effort to rescue ISIL fighters trapped there by the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) who have been defending the city.

It has now become increasingly clear that this assault took place on two fronts. At the south-west entrance to Kobane ISIL dispatched a column of 3 tanks headed by 2 Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Devices (VBIED's/truck bombs) and supported by infantry. At the northern Mursitpinar border crossing that directly links Kobane to Turkey ISIL again dispatched 2 VBIED's backed by 3 suicide bombers and a small detachment of infantry fighters. The attack on the Mursitpinar border crossing was launched from an industrial site within Turkey that is owned and operated by the state-run Turkish Grain Board (TMO). As it was completely unexpected this attack killed 9 YPG fighters and 4 civilians.

In response to the attack from Turkey the YPG immediately requested that Turkey acted to bring the attack to an end. Turkey answered this request with artillery fire. Unfortunately though they appear to have completely missed any ISIL positions instead hitting the centre of Kobane where a reported 6 civilians have been killed. Turkey has also cut off power to the camps housing refugees from Kobane and is using the vast numbers of troops and security forces they have in the area to impose a lock-down to prevent Kurds from moving and communicating with the outside world. Non-Kurds are apparently still fine to do as they like. Also someone has set fire to the hundreds of vehicles dumped by refugees on the border creating a smoke-screen that completely obscures the view of Kobane from Turkey.

Despite all this the YPG did succeed in repelling the attack in quite some style. At the Mursitpinar crossing they quickly responded to the surprise attack killing many of the ISIL infantry fighters and chasing the remainder back to the TMO site in Turkey whether I gather there were few survivors. At the south-western entrance the YPG were most certainly not surprised and destroyed both of the VBIED's with anti-tank weapons before they reached YPG positions. 2 of the 3 tanks were also destroyed in this manner and again the ISIL infantry fighters were either killed or chased off. Aside from that the YPG were also able to gain control of several positions in the south-west that they'd been trying to liberate for a number of days. This suggests that the ISIL fighters in those positions simply used the assault as an excuse to flee Kobane.

Alongside the 9 YPG fighters who were died at least 86 ISIL fighters were killed on Saturday making it a particularly bloody day for the group.

Today ISIL have announced that during yesterday's assault they succeeded in capturing several female YPG fighters (technically YPJ fighters being feminine) including Gill Rosenberg - a Canadian national who recently joined up to fight alongside the Kurds. As a female Rosenberg would obviously be a high value hostage to a group most of whose members only signed up because they couldn't get a girlfriend. However Rosenberg's value to ISIL is increased because she is Jewish and received her military training in the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) although I gather Israel currently has an arrest warrant out for her on an unrelated matter.

Although I haven't spoken to Rosenberg myself I understand that this claim by ISIL is completely untrue. The dozen of so westerners who have gone to assist the Kurds have really done so to provide training and technical assistance rather then fight. After all the Kurds have never worked with an advanced air force before. Plus the YPG commanders are smart enough to realise the propaganda value to ISIL of western hostages- particularly Jews. Therefore there aren't actually any foreigners in Kobane and the last I heard Rosenberg was in a training camp on the Iraqi border around 500km (300 miles) to the east.

So it appears that having attempted to score a propaganda victory with their assault on Kobane yesterday only for it to fail miserably ISIL have simply made the Rosenberg story up in an effort to change the subject and spare their blushes.

Away from Kobane the spat between the US-led coalition and the Syrian government over which of them is ISIL's main ally has continued. Last Wednesday (26/11/14) the predominately Shia-Arab Syrian government carried out a massive series of air-strikes against the ISIL stronghold of Raqqa to demonstrate that the Sunni-Arab insurgent group most certainly isn't their ally. On Saturday (29/11/14) the US-led coalition also carried out a massive series of around 30 air-strikes on Raqqa in an effort dispel suggestions that they were closely allied with ISIL.

Also on Saturday the Syrian government declared that the coalitions air-strikes had not succeeded in weakening ISIL in any way. I think that is an overly harsh assessment but with France setting a target of less then 4 weeks to defeat a similar enemy in Mali it is hard to understand why after nearly 4 months ISIL have yet to be completely defeated.

The fact that Turkey - a supposed member of the coalition - are now allowing ISIL to launch attacks from within their territory makes the discussion about who ISIL's allies are even more heated and presents the diplomatic equivalent of a 5-alarm fire or a massive unexploded bomb. How that diplomatic challenge is responded to depends very much on the actions of US President Barack Obama because he is supposedly the leader of the nation that is leading the coalition.

Sadly at this point we're still waiting for the US to even acknowledge that the events of yesterday occurred.

Seriously over the past day I've been watching reports on CNN International which mentioned that there was fresh fighting in Kobane and that US aircraft had carried out fresh strikes to the east of the city. However they just couldn't bring themselves to report that there were even accusations that the attack had originated in Turkey.

(Originally Posted) 18:10 on 30/11/14 (UK date).