Jarablus

A second group of Syrian police officers trained in Turkey as part of a joint initiative by Turkish forces and Free Syrian Army (FSA) factions has started to return to Syria.

Turkey's Euphrates Shield operation into Syria has delivered a major blow to the revenues of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), or DAESH, according to a report by the London-based International Center for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence (ICSR) and leading consultant group Ernst and Young (EY).

Turkish troops seized an explosive-packed vehicle prepared for an attack on a Turkish military convoy in the northern Syrian city of Jarablus last week, the army announced on Jan. 28.      

The bomb-laden car was seized on Jan. 21 and departed from the Manbij area on the western banks of the Euphrates River, according to a General Staff statement.      

When Turkey intervened in northern Syria five months ago, it claimed it had no designs on its former Ottoman dominion and that its only goals were to cleanse its borders of the Islamic State and to eliminate what it called the terrorist threat posed by the People’s Protection Units (YPG), the US-allied Kurdish militia that is paradoxically the most effective force against the jihadis.

A new Syrian police force trained and equipped by Turkey started work on Jan. 24 in the rebel-held border town of Jarablus, from which Turkey helped drive out Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants in recent months.

Clashes between Turkish forces and Turkish-backed Syrian rebels against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants intensified in the central parts of Syria's al-Bab, where 14 Turkish soldiers and 138 jihadists were killed in fighting on Dec. 21. 

Clashes between Turkish forces and Turkish-backed Syrian rebels against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants intensified in the central parts of Syria's al-Bab, where four Turkish soldiers and more than 45 jihadists were killed in fighting on Dec. 21. 

The wives of footballers at Fenerbahçe have sent aid to the Syrian city of Jarablus, recently liberated from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). 
The group sent winter clothes to children in the town after seeing campaigns on social media calling for help to meet the children's needs, NTV Spor reported on Nov. 18. 

As the Turkish, U.S. and French defense ministers were meeting in Brussels on Oct. 26 for an assessment on the situation in Mosul and Iraq in general, Ankara was focused on helping the Free Syria Army (FSA) take control in towns that are key for its border security.

Outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) militants kidnapped four people, including two civilians, in the southeastern province of Hakkari on Sept. 21, state-run Anadolu Agency has reported.

Hakkari Governor Cüneyit Orhan Toprak confirmed that PKK militants intercepted a civilian vehicle near Doğanlı village in the province's Çukurca district.