Islamic State 'boosts Raqqa defences' as Kurds advance

[Bosonic]

Source: BBC

Islamic State (IS) militants are reported to be shoring up the defences of Raqqa, the northern Syrian city that acts as the group's headquarters.

The move follows the capture on Tuesday by Kurdish fighters of a strategically -important town and nearby military base only 50km (30 miles) to the north.

The Kurds said on Wednesday that trenches were being dug around Raqqa.

The prices of basic supplies are also said to have risen in the city because key supply routes have been cut.

Read more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-33253497

[Fred Sanders]

1. This should be Top News. The World HQ of ISIS is under threat...and STILL the American media refuses to say Obama was right?

When Raqqa falls what will be the next demand/whining of the Obama Perfection Police?

Who will be the next manufactured imminent "threat to the Homeland" in order to keep frothy the perpetual Great American Fear?

Iran, N.K., Russia, you are in the on-deck circle. Again.

[IthinkThereforeIAM]

2. Agree...

... I have always had respect for the Kurds. I have always felt that one way or the other, the Kurds will end up saving Iraq, and that started back when Saddam was persecuting them and a few interviews with Kurdish leaders I had observed over the years.

PS: And Anthony Bourdain's visit to Kurdish Iraq and Turkey. Those folks were as hospitable as the folks in Knoxville, Iowa!

[Fred Sanders]

3. Since the entire media and even a vocal minority at DU are uninterested in Good News, seeing as how Obama might

get some of the deserved credit - the horror - here is some more:

https://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2015/Jun-24/303612-kurdish-militia-wants-syrian-rebels-to-lead-attack-on-isis-hq.ashx

Also headlined as "Obama ISIS Military Strategy May Pay Off Big in Northern Iraq; Media Stunned into Silence?"

"The Obama administration has touted Kurdish-led advances as a model for the U.S.-backed effort to roll back the extremist group. A U.S. plan to train and equip the "moderate" opposition to fight the militants is stumbling.

The capture of Tel Abyad at the Turkish border last week severed an important ISIS supply route.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an activist group which monitors the war, said ISIS had called in reinforcements of 100 truckload of weapons and ammunition which it was believed to be deploying at a military base on the Raqqa outskirts.

YPG spokesman Redur Xelil told Reuters the Kurds had received information that ISIS had "begun digging trenches in the vicinity of Raqqa to improve their defenses."