US backed fighters almost surround IS stronghold in Syira

“Daesh is preparing for a battle inside the city”, Bali said using an Arabic acronym to refer to IS.

Iran is a major backer of embattled Syrian President Bashar Assad. Tehran has provided the Syrian government with military and political backing for years. A number of Iranian soldiers have been killed in Syria, including high-ranking officers.

Another blast occurred when a suicide bomber rammed his explosives-laden vehicle into an Iraqi army checkpoint north of Baghdad.

In another attack, in the town of Taji 12 miles north of Baghdad, seven civilians and five troops were killed, and up to 30 people were wounded. Kurdish and Arab security officials in northern Iraq said they also could not confirm the report.

“I can say that the matter of liberating Manbij is settled”, he said.

More Western forces massed in the Mediterranean, where a second USA navy aircraft carrier battle group was approaching the Straits of Gibraltar.

The US military says the offensive on Manbij is being led by 3,000 local Arab fighters, backed by 500 Kurdish militiamen. Iraq’s elite counterterrorism forces secured the southern edge of Fallujah on Sunday and pushed into the city itself Wednesday. Fallujah is a historic bastion of the Sunni insurgency, first against the USA occupation of Iraq in 2003, and then against the Shiite-led authorities that took over the country.

IS has controlled large areas of both countries since declaring its self-styled “caliphate” in 2014 but is losing territory in the face of separate assaults.

U.S.-backed forces seized control of the last route into Islamic State-held city of Manbij in northern Syria on Friday, completing their encirclement of the main target in a major advance against the militants, a monitoring group said. The official with the French Defense Ministry, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the record, said its forces are with SDF fighters who are fighting against IS. The. He didn’t provide other details.

French Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian had indicated last Friday, in remarks to a small state TV channel covering French politics, that French troops were helping operations at Manbij. “We are helping with arms, we are helping with aerial support, we are helping with advice”, he said. If the U.S.-backed Syria Democratic Forces capture Manbij, it will be the extremists’ biggest defeat in Syria since government forces took the central historic town of Palmyra in March.

Government bombardment of rebel-held eastern Aleppo hit within a few hundred metres (yards) of three medical facilities on Wednesday, including near Al-Hakim and near the Al-Bayan hospital, leaving at least 15 civilians dead.

Monitors confirmed that the Syria Democratic Forces – an alliance which includes the powerful Kurdish YPG militia and Arab allies – had advanced to within firing distance of the road, one week into a campaign to push the militants out of their foothold along the frontier.

“There’s no road left… they’re all cut”, said Rami Abdulrahman, director of the UK-based group.