Hundreds of fighters flee ruins of last stand
Five hundred Islamic State fighters are among thousands of people who have fled the Syrian village where the jihadists are making their last stand.
The exodus from Baghouz over the past two days is slowing the pace of the attack by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the Kurdish-led coalition that is leading the ground offensive on Isis.
A pause and a humanitarian corridor established by the SDF on Tuesday allowed 3500 people to flee the village including 500 Isis fighters, according to Mustafa Bali, the SDF spokesman. This was more than the previous estimates of how many people were still holding out. Five captured SDF fighters were freed.
Figures suggest that 10,000 people have left the village in the past two weeks.
It was confirmed that two of France’s best-known jihadists, Fabien and Jean-Michel Clain, were killed in strikes on Baghouz.
Fabien, 41, recorded the sixminute audio clip in which Isis claimed responsibility for the Paris attacks in November 2015 that killed 130 people. His brother, 38, provided the backing ‘‘nasheed’’ or religious chant for the recording, as well as for other Isis propaganda tapes.
The French authorities said on February 21 that they thought Fabien had been killed in an airstrike. The US-led coalition later said that it had killed him on February 20.
It was unclear what had happened to Jean-Michel until Tuesday when his wife, Dorothee Maquere, who left Baghouz along with thousands of men, women and children, confirmed that Fabien had been killed on February 20. Jean-Michel was injured and then killed two days later in a mortar strike.
Drones and jets have been bombing what is left of Baghouz, but the humanitarian pauses allowed trucks to be sent in to collect those wishing to surrender. They were divided into fighters, who were sent to detention camps, and non-combatants, almost all women and children.
Non-combatants were screened for weapons and explosives then put on trucks and ferried north to the al-Hawl and Roj displaced people’s camps in northeastern Syria, which are overflowing with tens of thousands of residents. Many remain hardline Isis supporters.
A handful of Yazidis have also been released from Baghouz but hundreds more may still be inside as human shields. Others have converted to Islam, and some young boys have been reported to be fighting with Isis.
One group of 11 rescued boys, including one who told The Times
that he had been able to speak to his parents by telephone for the first time in 41⁄2 years, was taken back to Iraq and their home town of Sinjar at the weekend.
There, to cheering crowds, they were reunited with what remained of their families. ‘‘Did anything happen here?’’ one of the boys was heard to ask.