Raqqa offensive

Turkey has repeated its offer to the U.S. to jointly stage the long-anticipated Raqqa operation with the inclusion of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) and including Arab forces within the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), Defense Minister Fikri Işık said on April 21. 

U.S. President Donald Trump and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan will meet in Washington in May ahead of a NATO summit, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu has said. 

The US-backed Kurdish-Arab force leading the fight for the ISIS’s Syrian bastion Raqqa announced Tuesday the creation of a “civilian council” to administer the city after its capture.

“The civilian council of Raqqa will be charged with administering Raqqa and the surrounding province after liberation,” the Syrian Democratic Forces said in a statement.

A coalition air strike accidentally killed 18 members of a U.S.-backed Arab-Kurdish alliance fighting the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) near a key town in northern Syria, the U.S.-led coalition said on April 13.

Fighting at a dam held by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in northern Syria put it out of service yesterday, risking dangerous rising water levels, a technical source told AFP.

The international coalition battling the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) will begin a final push on the jihadists' Syrian stronghold Raqqa in the coming days, French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said on March 24.

Forces such as Apache helicopters, U.S. Marine artillery and special operation troops were part of a U.S.-led coalition operation to air drop Syrian militia into an area near the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant's (ISIL) stronghold Raqqa, a U.S. official said on March 22. 

The U.S.-led coalition has airlifted Syrian rebel forces to an operation near the Syrian town of Tabqa in Raqqa province while providing them with fire support, U.S. defense officials said on March 22.

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. 

Damascus will consider any military operation without the approval of the Syrian authorities to be an invasion, be it Raqqa or any other city, Syrian President Bashar Assad told Russian journalists.

Media reports suggested on Wednesday that 1,000 more troops would be sent into Syria to back the offensive against Daesh in the city of Raqqa.