Small Wars Journal

Efforts Resume to Evacuate Civilians From IS Area in Syria

Wed, 02/20/2019 - 12:11am

Efforts Resume to Evacuate Civilians from IS Area in Syria – Associated Press

Dozens of trucks arrived Tuesday at the outskirts of a besieged enclave held by the Islamic State group in eastern Syria, signaling renewed efforts to evacuate hundreds of civilians trapped in the militants' last patch of territory along the Euphrates River.

 

A spokesman for the U.S.-backed Syrian militia that is spearheading the fight against IS said a military operation aimed at ousting the extremists from the enclave will begin if they don't surrender.

 

Such an operation would take place after separating or evacuating civilians from the militants, estimated to be about 300 combatants, said Mustafa Bali, the spokesman for the Syrian Democratic Forces.

 

The Islamic State group has been reduced from its self-proclaimed caliphate that once spread across much of Syria and Iraq at its height in 2014 to a speck of land on the countries' shared border. In that tiny pocket on the banks of the river, the militants are hiding among civilians in the shadow of a small hill, encircled by forces waiting to declare the territorial defeat of the extremist group…

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