GAZIANTEP, Turkey — Syrian rebels, backed by Turkey and the United States, pushed deeper toward U.S.-backed Kurdish positions in northern Syria on Monday, as Turkey’s foreign minister warned the Kurds to “immediately” pull back east of the Euphrates River or face more assaults.
The deepening animosities came a day after the Pentagon urged the American allies to stop fighting each other and refocus their efforts against the Islamic State, calling the clashes “unacceptable.”
But by Monday evening, the Syrian rebels said they had crossed the al-Sajour River, about nine miles north of the town of Manbij, which is controlled by Kurdish-aligned fighters. A Kurdish spokesman said the rebels had reached the river but had not crossed it.
Tensions have mounted since Turkish tanks, backed by U.S. and Turkish warplanes, pushed across the border into northern Syria last week, quickly seizing the Islamic State-controlled town of Jarabulus. In the following days, Syrian rebels of the U.S.-backed Free Syrian Army have swept southward and westward to target the Islamic State but have mostly clashed with Kurdish-aligned fighters.
On Monday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based monitoring group, said areas south of Jarabulus were experiencing heavy bombardment by Turkish forces as well as clashes between the rebels and Kurdish-led groups. The group said that the rebels had seized 21 villages in the past four days and that the Turkish assaults had killed 40 civilians and wounded 70. Turkey has denied targeting civilians.
Turkey, which is battling an internal Kurdish insurgency, has long been concerned that the Syrian Kurds could try to forge an independent state along the border by linking two Kurdish enclaves in northwestern Syria. That, Ankara fears, could embolden Kurdish aspirations for self-determination in Turkey.
Washington has demanded that the People’s Protection Units (YPG), the military wing of the main Syrian Kurdish party, pull back to the east side of the Euphrates. The forces, which form the backbone of the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), crossed the river and wrested control of Manbij, 25 miles south of Jarabulus, from the Islamic State this month.
YPG officials insist that their fighters have returned across the river. But Turkey and its proxies say they have not kept their promise.
“The YPG has to immediately cross east of the Euphrates River as they promised the United States and as they announced they would,” Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Monday. “If they don’t, they will be a target.”
