Civilians evacuating Islamic State-held enclave in Syria
Baghouz, Syria — Young girls and boys stared out of the back of trucks, their faces dirty, their eyes filled with terror, exhaustion and uncertainty, as hundreds of men, women and children were evacuated from the Islamic State group’s last enclave in eastern Syria on Wednesday. The evacuation may signal an imminent end to the territorial rule of the militants’ self-declared “caliphate” that once stretched across much of Syria and Iraq.
Their condition pointed to the squalor that IS has been reduced to in the tiny tent camp on the banks of the Euphrates River. Food and water have been running out in the pocket, where some 300 IS militants along with hundreds of civilians — believed to be mostly their families — have been under siege for more than a week by U.S.backed forces. Conditions have been so bad that at least 60 people previously evacuated from the militants’ shrinking territory subsequently died of malnutrition or exhaustion.
The U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces surrounding the patch of land have been unable to carry out a final assault on it because of the presence of the civilians. It was unclear how after days of militants preventing civilians from leaving, the organized evacuation of hundreds was possible. SDF officials did not say how many were in the convoy or how many remain in the pocket.
Adnan Afrin, an SDF spokesman, said a number of IS fighters were hiding among the civilians evacuating the enclave and later were arrested. He didn’t elaborate.
SDF officials said clashes overnight, airstrikes and special operations facilitated the movement of the hundreds of civilians toward exits already designated by the SDF and trucks that had already been sent for evacuation. Witnesses said there were overnight strikes in the enclave. SDF officials said earlier that some militants asked for an exit, a request they declined. Instead, they said a military operation would follow the evacuation and separation of civilians.
The enclave’s recapture by U.S.backed Syrian fighters would spell the territorial defeat of IS and allow President Donald Trump to begin withdrawing American troops from northern Syria, as he has pledged to do, opening a new chapter in Syria’s eight-year civil war.
Few believe, however, that ending the group’s territorial rule will end the threat posed by an organization that still stages and inspires attacks through sleeper cells in both Syria and Iraq.
In past weeks, nearly 20,000 have walked for hours through a humanitarian corridor to exit the militants’ last patch of territory along the river. Many paid smugglers and some have come under fire from the militants for attempting to leave.