At least 26 combatants were killed on Sunday as Turkish-backed Syrian fighters launched an offensive on the northern Manbij area. This military operation came just days after these fighters had seized the Kurdish-held enclave of Tal Rifaat.
The pro-Turkey forces had already retaken Tal Rifaat the previous week, following a series of incursions into government-held territories by Islamist-led rebels. These rebels captured significant cities before advancing toward Damascus on Sunday.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war monitoring organization, reported that pro-Turkish factions seized large districts of Manbij city in the eastern Aleppo countryside after engaging in violent clashes with the Manbij Military Council. The Manbij Military Council is affiliated with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which effectively function as the military arm of the Kurdish administration controlling large portions of Syria’s northeast.
The fighting resulted in the death of nine pro-Turkish fighters and at least 17 combatants from the Manbij Military Council, according to the Observatory, which relies on a network of contacts within Syria. The US-backed SDF also reported “fierce clashes,” indicating that the military councils in both Manbij and Al-Bab were inflicting significant damage on the Turkish-backed forces.
In a statement released on their Telegram channel, Ankara-backed factions claimed to have “taken control of the city of Manbij” following intense battles. They shared videos purportedly showing their fighters celebrating their control over the city, though AFP was unable to independently verify the authenticity of these videos.
Earlier on Sunday, SDF commander Mazloum Abdi remarked on the “historic” significance of the moment, celebrating the fall of what he termed the “authoritarian regime” of President Bashar al-Assad.
