American-led intervention in Syria

BELGRADE - Damascus has a recording of conversations between the American military and Islamic State terrorists ahead of the US-led coalition airstrike that hit Syrian troops near Deir ez-Zor on September 17, the speaker of the People's Council of Syria said.

BELGRADE - The US Ambassador to the United Nations claims that Russia is responsible for the horrors that have descended upon Syria, but remained silent about the 1.5 million civilians whose water was shut off by US-backed rebels.

Syrian state TV said Sept. 21 that a military warplane had crashed and the pilot was rescued after carrying out a combat mission against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) northwest of the capital, Damascus.

Turkey supports plans to drive the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) out of its Syrian stronghold of Raqqa and it would not act alone in any such operation, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has stated. 

Turkey supports plans to drive the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) out of its Syrian stronghold of Raqqa and it would not act alone in any such operation, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has stated. 

BELGRADE - The Pentagon has said that the US-led coalition's airstrike on the Syrian Arab Army's base in Deir el-Zor was unintentional, but Russian officials and lawmakers have been concerned that the attack, the first ever by the US-led forces on the Syrian troops, could have been a "deliberate" move that risks undermining the Russia-US brokered ceasefire.

U.S.-led coalition air strikes killed dozens of Syrian soldiers on Sept. 17, endangering a U.S.-Russian brokered cease-fire and prompting an emergency U.N. Security Council meeting as tensions between Moscow and Washington escalated. 

The Pentagon said on Sept. 16 that a U.S.-led coalition airstrike on Sept. 7 killed an Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) leader who oversaw the extremist militant group's propaganda.

Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said that the airstrike took place near Raqqa and targeted and killed Wa'il Adil Hasan Salman al-Fayad, also known as Dr. Wa'il.

The British embassy in the capital Ankara has announced it will be closed on Sept. 16 over security concerns, while Germany has also temporarily closed its embassy, all other consular offices and a school in Turkey, reportedly due to fears of a possible terror attack.

Turkey does not currently have a military plan for an assault on the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) jihadist group's stronghold of Raqqa in Syria, Presidential Spokesperson İbrahim Kalın has said.