(MENAFN- The Peninsula) US-led aircraft hammered Islamic State (IS) fighters with 21 bombing raids near Kobane on Monday and yesterday amid signs the strikes had "slowed" the group's advance on the Syrian border town, the American military said.
In one of the heaviest bombardments so far against the Sunni militants encircling Kobane, coalition air strikes "destroyed" two IS staging locations, a building, a truck, two vehicles, three compounds and damaged several other targets, it said.
A separate air raid in eastern Syria struck a small oil refinery, it said. "Indications are that air strikes have slowed ISIL advances" around Kobane, US Central Command, which is overseeing the air campaign, said in a statement.
"However, the security situation on the ground there remains fluid, with ISIL attempting to gain territory and Kurdish militia continuing to hold out," it said, using another acronym for the Islamic State group. The air strikes are designed to "interdict" IS reinforcements and resupply efforts as well as prevent the group from "massing combat power" against the Kurdish-held parts of Kobane, it said. US fighter jets and bombers took part in the raids along with aircraft from Saudi Arabia, according to Central Command.
The IS group has steadily gained ground around Kobane and has reportedly captured nearly half of the town, which lies close to the Turkish border.
IS militants have also been advancing in Iraq's western province of Anbar. Central Command also said coalition warplanes carried out one air raid in Iraq in the past 24 hours, southwest of Kirkuk, destroying two IS vehicles.
An Iraqi MP and prominent militia leader was one of at least 21 people killed yesterday in a suicide bombing immediately claimed by the IS group. Ahmed Al Khafaji, a commander in the Shia Badr militia, was killed in the attack in the Kadhimiyah area of Baghdad, a fellow lawmaker and a medical official said.
The bombing, which wounded at least another 51 people, was the third in the Shia district of Kadhimiyah in four days.
Khafaji was a member of the main Shia bloc in parliament, the State of Law coalition, of which Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi's Dawa party is also part. In a statement posted online, the IS said that a suicide bomber it identified as Abu Aisha Al Samarraie had carried out the attack and that Khafaji was the target.
Meanwhile, military commanders from more than 20 countries met yesterday in Washington to discuss the fight against IS militants in Syria and Iraq after more than two months of US-led air strikes failed to halt the militants' advance.
The US military's top-ranking officer, General Martin Dempsey, hosted the talks at Andrews Air Force base outside the US capital, the first such gathering of top brass from so many nations since the coalition against the IS was formed in September.
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