BEIRUT—U.S.-backed Syrian fighters on Thursday gave ISIS 48 hours to leave an encircled town near the Turkish border without a fight, a last-ditch effort to protect civilian lives, according to a statement issued by the group.
The Manbij Military Council, which is part of the U.S.-supported Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, said the initiative represents the “only and last” opportunity for ISIS militants to “leave the town alive.”
Backed by U.S.-led coalition airstrikes, SDF fighters have encircled Manbij and seized western parts of the ISIS-held town but have so far avoided an all-out assault to minimize civilian casualties. However, airstrikes in the Manbij countryside blamed on the coalition have killed scores of civilians in the past few days, including children.
The statement accused ISIS of using civilians as human shields and said it would allow the group a last opportunity to leave the town with their “individual weapons” to a location of their choice. Manbij is an ISIS hub and lies on a key supply route to ISIS’s de facto capital of Raqqa. If Manbij is captured by the U.S.-backed fighters, it will be the biggest strategic defeat for ISIS in Syria since July 2015, when the extremist group lost the border town of Tal Abyad.
The fighting around Manbij coincides with an uptick in fighting in the contested city of Aleppo where government forces have completely encircled the eastern, rebel-held parts of the city, trapping hundreds of thousands of people inside.
Stephen O'Brien, the U.N.’s emergency relief coordinator, said he is “gravely alarmed” by developments in eastern Aleppo. “Food in east Aleppo is expected to run out by the middle of next month,” he warned.
The head of delegation for the International Committee of the Red Cross in Syria described the situation as “devastating and overwhelming,” with heavy and indiscriminate shelling and an “untold numbers of civilian casualties.”
“The bombing is constant. The violence is threatening hundreds of thousands of people’s lives, homes and livelihoods,” said Marianne Gasser, according to an ICRC statement. It said Gasser was in Aleppo.
Meanwhile, the U.N.’s children agency condemned the killing of children amid Syria’s ongoing civil war following brutal incidents in the country’s north.
In a statement distributed Thursday, UNICEF said dozens of children were among those killed in airstrikes in and around Manbij in the past few days.
The U.S.-led coalition has not commented on the accusations but has stepped up its airstrikes on the area, which is controlled by the Islamic State group.
“No matter where they are in Syria or under whose control they live - absolutely nothing justifies attacks on children,” UNICEF said.
