Erdogan sees threat from Kurdish gains in Syria - Al-Monitor: The Middle Eastʼs leading independent news source since 2012

Week in Review

Week in Review

Jun 20, 2015

Syrian refugees from Tell Abyad (foreground) line up at the border crossing as others wait behind the fences to cross into Turkey at the Akcakale border gate in Sanliurfa province, Turkey, June 14, 2015. — REUTERS/Kadir Celikcan

Syrian refugees from Tel Abyad wait on the Turkish-Syrian border after crossing into Turkey near the Akcakale border gate in Sanliurfa province, Turkey, June 14, 2015. Kurdish-led militia backed by U.S.-led air strikes fought Islamic State near a Syrian town at the Turkish border on Sunday, a monitoring group and a Kurdish official said, in an advance that has worried Turkey. Concerned about an expansion of Kurdish sway in Syria, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said Kurdish groups were taking over areas ev

Erdogan fears fall of Syria's Tell Abyad

Fehim Tastekin

In Paris, reporting on Turkish politics

Captured fighter details Islamic State's Turkey connection

Amberin Zaman

In London, reporting on geopolitics, minorities, human rights, culture

Druze children look at an Israeli army mobile artillery unit in Buqata in the Golan Heights April 27, 2015. An Israeli air strike killed four militants on Sunday as they placed an explosive on a fence near Israel's frontier with Syria in the annexed Golan Heights, an Israeli military source said. Tensions have risen in the Golan Heights, territory Israel captured from Syria in a 1967 war and later annexed in a move never recognised internationally, amid the civil war raging in Syria in the past four years.

Will Israel reach out to Syrian Druze?

In Tel Aviv, reporting on national security, Israeli politics, defense

A man walks past abandoned buildings in the northern Syrian town of Kobani January 30, 2015. Sheets meant to hide residents from snipers' sights still hang over streets in the Syrian border town of Kobani, and its shattered buildings and cratered roads suggest those who fled are unlikely to return soon. Kurdish forces said this week they had taken full control of Kobani, a mainly Kurdish town near the Turkish border, after months of bombardment by Islamic State, an al Qaeda offshoot that has spread across S

The Islamic State's scorched earth policy in Kobani

Massoud Hamid