31 IS Militants Killed in Syria

Thirty-one self-styled Islamic State militants have been killed in clashes and US-led coalition airstrikes in northern Syria over the last 24 hours, the Turkish military said on Sunday, marking an escalation in violence in the area. Syrian rebels, backed by Turkish tanks and airstrikes, have been pushing toward the IS stronghold of Dabiq, a village with symbolic importance to the militants, in an operation launched in late August, Reuters reported. Fourteen IS fighters were killed as they attempted to enter the militant-controlled villages of Akhtarin and Turkmen Bareh, 3 kilometers east of Dabiq, the Turkish Army said in a statement. The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Saturday that IS fighters had captured those villages in a counter attack near the Turkish border. Another 17 IS fighters were killed in airstrikes by coalition warplanes in the same areas, the military said in its daily roundup on the operation, dubbed “Euphrates Shield”. It said two Syrian militants had been killed and 19 wounded in the latest fighting against IS. The operation has also targeted a Kurdish militia whose presence along its border Turkey sees as a threat.