US Sends F-16s to Turkish Air Base for Anti-IS Efforts

The U.S. has deployed F-16 fighter jets to Turkey to aid the air campaign against ISIS in Syria, according to yesterday’s report by NBC News.

Aaron Stein, a non-resident fellow at the Atlantic Council research institute, said Al-Nusra’s withdrawal could make it easier for Washington to work with ground forces in the would-be IS-free zone.

US and Turkish officials last month described plans to provide military support to Syrian rebels to clear the Islamic State from a roughly 60-mile strip of territory on the Turkish border.

If IS is proven to be responsible for the bombing, it would mark the group’s first strike on Turkish soil.

But it has also pushed for the creation of a buffer zone in certain areas of the 500-mile border with Syria, specifically from the town of Azaz to the Kurdish enclave of Afrin in Aleppo province.

The troops and aircraft came from the 31st Fighter Air Wing in Aviano, Italy, a department release said.

The rebel commander said it was the most fierce Islamic State attack in the area in several months.

It said its fighters would evacuate their positions on the frontline against Islamic State in northern Aleppo province but would continue to fight the jihadist group elsewhere in Syria.

With the arrival of U.S. aircraft and drones, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has stated that a “comprehensive battle” against the Muslim extremists will be launched soon.

Even if the Al-Qaeda brand will not be part of the critical northern battleground of Aleppo, Nusra might consider its interests to be represented militarily through other members of the Jaysh al-Fatah coalition, including Ahrar al-Sham.

IS fighters then seized the village after heavy clashes with rival groups. The explosion also damaged neighboring buildings and about 20 cars parked nearby, the private Dogan news agency reported.

The PKK has meanwhile, kept up its attacks on the Turkish state, killing at least 20 members of the security forces since the start of the latest cycle of violence that has shattered a ceasefire declared in 2013.

The fighting groups and factions in the land of Syria have the ability to fight the renegades [Islamic State] if they united and joined – within the Sharia ways and means – and adhered to the Rope of Allah the Almighty, without having to rely on regional or worldwide forces.