For Kobani refugees and Turkish Kurds gathered in the villages along the border and on the hills to the west of Kobani to watch the month-long battle, the fact that the fight is still going on is inspiring dreams that somehow the town won’t succumb to the jihadists. They dismiss the apparent hopelessness of the military plight of the YPG in Kobani—the Kurdish defenders are outgunned and heavily outnumbered and are being attacked from three sides, having lost all the high ground around the town. “We won’t lose Kobani, “ insists a bank manager from the town who is now a refugee. “I trust the YPG fighters, they will hold and win,” he adds.
A Kurdish member of the Turkish parliament concurs. Ibrahim Binici says, “Kobani will not fall. The situation in the town is good and they killed 70 IS fighters on Friday night.” But he admits the defenders need more weapons and says he and other local parliamentarians are doing all they can to persuade the Turkish government to allow a corridor for YPG fighters from the northeastern Syrian town of Qamishli and Turkish Kurdish volunteers to cross the border and join the battle.
The battle is also taking a heavy toll in ISIS fighters. A high profile American jihadist who defected from Al Qaeda earlier this year to join ISIS was reported by YPG sources to have been killed Sunday in fierce fighting in Kobani. Abu Mohammad Al Amriki was first featured in an ISIS recruitment video in February. Speaking in heavily accented English, he said he had lived in the US for ten years or so before traveling to Syria. He joined the Al Qaeda affiliate Jabhat Al Nusra first but then shifted allegiance and became a poster boy for “Jihad Cool” foreign fighters. Pictures of him were featured heavily in ISIS propaganda tailored for foreign audiences.
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