U.S. Central Command

The Trump administration is ready to press ahead with a U.S.-backed military offensive to evict the Islamic State from its last remaining urban stronghold in the Syrian city of Raqqa over strong objections from Turkey.

President Donald Trump is expected to inform his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, of the U.S. plans when he visits the White House later this month.

U.S.-led coalition forces against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), are patrolling the Turkey-Syria border in the wake of Turkey's operation in Iraq and Syria, the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) told state-run Anadolu Agency on April 29.      

It has been revealed that both the American and the Russian military attachés were called to Turkish military headquarters in Ankara a short while before Turkish jets hit outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) positions on Sinjar Mountain in northern Iraq and northern Syria at 2 a.m. on April 25.

Hours before U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson's arrival in Ankara on the evening of March 29, Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım said on NTV that Turkey's "Euphrates Shield" operation on Syria soil had been completed.

When the insignia of the People's Protection Units (YPG), a red star on a yellow triangle - a version of the symbol of many left-wing militant organizations around the world - first appeared as badges on the arms of the U.S. Special Forces in Syria in May 2016, the Turkish government was furious about it.

The United States' preparations regarding the Raqqa operation have accelerated; they have started forming supply lines and delivering logistics equipment. A portion of the heavy weapons have already arrived, but more will come. 

As the spring equinox starts with March 21, which is celebrated as the ancient new year under the name of Nevruz or Newroz in many eastern cultures, preparations are about to be completed for a major offensive on the Syrian city of Raqqa, which has been under occupation by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) since January 2014. According to diplomatic sources, if the operation does

The United States has said it conducted an air strike in Syria against an al-Qaeda meeting but denied deliberately targeting a mosque where a monitor said 46 people were killed on March 17.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said most of the dead in the raid on al-Jineh, in Aleppo province, were civilians.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said on March 2 that Ankara was resolved to march on the Syrian town of Manbij if the U.S. forces do not immediately evacuate the Kurdish militants there to east of the Euphrates. 

Çavuşoğlu made that statement after briefing Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee on recent developments in Syria.

The top U.S. military commander for the Middle East made a secret trip to northern Syria on Feb. 24 to meet a U.S.-backed alliance fighting the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), officials said.

General Joseph Votel, who heads U.S. Central Command (Centcom), met with leaders from the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).