Turkish drone strikes kill eight Kurdish-held zone in Syria

Following Ankara’s threats targeting Kurdish military facilities in Syria and Iraq, at least eight people have been killed in Turkish drone strikes on the Kurdish-held region of northeastern Syria on Thursday, according to a war monitor and a local security source. According to the security source, two people were killed in a hit on a car near a military installation, while another six were murdered in a later strike on a military position near the town of Amuda. Turkey said on Wednesday that all Kurdish insurgent installations in Syria and Iraq are legitimate targets, after determining that the two assailants who blew a bomb in front of government buildings in Ankara last weekend were from Syria. The Syrian Democratic Forces, the U.S.-backed force dominated by the Kurdish YPG and which spearheaded a years-long campaign against the Islamic State group, has denied the bombers came through territory it controls. SDF head, Mazloum Abdi, said on Wednesday in a post on the social media platform X that Turkey was looking for “pretexts” to carry on attacking SDF-held areas. Aladdin al-Ali, an aid worker running a camp for displaced people in northeast Syria, said relief organizations “suspended their work and left” following a strike near the camp. Ankara has frequently carried out air strikes in northern Iraq against the outlawed PKK militia, which is designated as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the European Union, and the United States. It has also carried out several cross-border incursions into Syria targeting the YPG, which it views as a terrorist group affiliated with the PKK. (With inputs from agencies)