More than 2,000 killed in Syria since start of Ramadan, NGO says.

More than 2,000 killed in Syria since start of Ramadan, NGO says.

Free Syrian Army fighters pray along a street in Aleppo's
 Salaheddine neighborhood on July 9, 2013. (Reuters)

Al Arabia | 26 Jul 2013 :: At least 2,014 people have been killed in Syria’s civil war since the Muslim holy month of Ramadan began on July 10, a watchdog said on Thursday.

More than 1,323 of the dead were pro- and anti-regime fighters, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights told the Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said that the overall “toll has been particularly high in the past four days,” adding that both camps “concealed the real number of dead so the real toll is actually higher.”

The Britain-based Observatory said that 438 army soldiers were killed in Ramadan, and 69 members of the government’s paramilitary National Defense Force were killed.

Meanwhile, 545 civilians who joined the rebels were killed in the Muslim holy month. Thirty of them were soldiers who had defected from the Syrian army, and 241 were foreign and unidentified fighters.

The death toll also included 639 civilians, including 105 children and 99 women, most of whom were killed in army shelling, said the Observatory.

An additional 52 unidentified corpses were accounted for in the Observatory's toll.

According to the Observatory, more than 100,000 people have been killed in the Syrian conflict so far, which began after President Bashar al-Assad’s regime unleashed a brutal crackdown against a March 2011 popular revolt calling for change.

The United Nations estimates that some 5,000 people a month are dying in Syria's civil war.(Courtesy:Al Arabia)

NGO: Clashes between Kurds, jihadists kill 29 in Syria.

NGO: Clashes between Kurds, jihadists kill 29 in Syria.

Al-Nusra Front member holds the jihdist group’s flag in
 Raqqa province, eastern Syria. (File photo: Reuters)

Beirut |AFP |18  Jul 2013 :: At least 29 people have been killed in fighting between Kurdish and jihadist fighters in northern Syria in the past two days, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Thursday.

“At least 19 Al-Nusra Front (jihadist) fighters and 10 Kurds have been killed since the day before yesterday in clashes in the oil region of Hassakeh,” the NGO said.

On Wednesday, the group said Syrian Kurdish fighters had pushed members of Al-Nusra and the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant out of the town of Ras al-Ain and its nearby border crossing with Turkey.

The clashes between Kurdish fighters and jihadists erupted after Al-Nusra Front militants attacked a convoy of Kurdish women fighters, Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said.

Activists in Ras al-Ain said members of the jihadist groups had taken advantage of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, which began last week, to try to impose their extreme version of Islam.

In the early days of the Syria conflict, when the opposition was desperate for help from any quarter, jihadist fighters were welcomed but a spate of abuses has fuelled a major backlash.

The Observatory said that jihadist fighters began firing rockets at Ras al-Ain, in western Hassakeh, after their expulsion.

They also attacked several roadblocks manned by Kurdish fighters and clashes were ongoing in the village of Tall Alu and Karhok in eastern Hassakeh, the group added.

Kurdish fighters meanwhile advanced elsewhere in the northeastern province, taking control of part of the Sweidiya area of Hassakeh, which is the only majority Kurdish province in Syria.

Syria’s Kurdish minority have walked a sometimes ambiguous line in the country’s conflict, which is now in its third year.

Despite occasionally cooperating with rebel fighters, the country’s Kurds have largely chosen to remain outside the conflict, and have sought to keep both regime troops and rebels out of their areas.

Their position has earned them the ire of some rebels, who fault them for failing to back the uprising.

And the community’s more liberal interpretation of Islam has also made it a target for some extremist rebel groups, including Al-Nusra and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.(Courtesy:AL Arabia)

Jihadists expelled from flashpoint Kurdish Syrian town, NGO says.

Jihadists expelled from flashpoint Kurdish Syrian town, NGO says.

Kurdish fighters have taken near-total control of the town of Ras al-Ain
 (pictured), near the Turkish border, on July 17, 2013. (File photo: AFP)

Beirut | AFP | 17 Jul 2013 :: Kurdish fighters have expelled Jihadists from the Syrian flashpoint frontier town of Ras al-Ain near Turkey, a watchdog said Wednesday, adding that only the border crossing remains under the extremists’ control.

Kurdish fighters “have taken near-total control of Ras al-Ain after fierce battles raged since [Tuesday] evening, pitting [Kurds] against al-Nusra Front, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and other groups,” said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Ras al-Ain is home to a majority Kurdish population and is of strategic importance given its location close to Turkey.

Its fighters are trying to ensure neither the regime of President Bashar al-Assad nor the opposition takes control of its areas.
The clashes between Kurdish fighters and Jihadists broke out after al-Nusra Front attacked a convoy of Kurdish women fighters, according to Observatory Director Rami Abdel Rahman.

Nine Jihadists and two Kurdish fighters have been killed since battles erupted in Ras al-Ain Tuesday, said the Observatory.

Activists in Ras al-Ain said members of the Jihadist groups had taken advantage of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, which began last week, to try to impose their extreme version of Islam.

In the early days of the Syrian conflict, when opponents of the Assad regime were desperate for assistance from any quarter, jihadist fighters were welcomed but a spate of abuses has fuelled a major backlash.(Courtesy:Al Arabia)