US Drops Small Arms Ammo To Syrian Rebels

US military cargo planes gave 50 tons of ammunition to rebel groups overnight in northern Syria, using an air drop of 112 pallets as the first step in the Obama Administration’s urgent effort to find new ways to support those groups.

Kurdish official Idriss Nassan said the newly declared Democratic Forces of Syria was meant to expel Islamic State from its de facto capital of al-Raqqa in north-eastern Syria.

The US military headquarters in charge of the coalition campaign against IS said in an email to The Associated Press that it had made no delivery of weapons or ammunition directly to the Syrian Kurds in the last week.

The alliance was announced in a statement published online by a spokesman for the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG).

The money will instead be used to provide much-needed ammunition and a few weapons to commanders of rebel groups already established on the ground.

Moscow entered Syria’s multi-faceted civil war last month, when it began air strikes against Islamic State jihadists and other “terrorists” fighting against the regime of its ally President Bashar al-Assad.

A Saudi source said the defence minister, a son of the Saudi king, had told Putin that Russia’s intervention would escalate the war and inspire militants from around the world to go there to fight.

European foreign ministers, meeting in Luxembourg, issued a statement calling on Moscow to halt its bombing of Assad’s moderate enemies immediately.

Riyadh would continue to support Assad’s opponents and demand that he leave power, the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Groups representing Arab tribes and Syriac Christians are also listed as participating in the new force.

Russian warplanes carried out at least 30 air strikes on the town of Kafr Nabuda in Hama province in western Syria, and hundreds of shells hit the area.

Sahl al-Ghab lies at the intersection of the provinces of Hama, Latakia and Idlib – controlled by the powerful Army of Conquest rebel alliance, which includes Al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front – and has been a major target for Russian strikes.

In central Syria, Russian jets intensified airstrikes as government forces battled insurgents in a strategic area near a rebel-held province and a government stronghold.