Hundreds of Daesh Hostages Freed in Northern Syria
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – The Daesh (also known as ISIL and ISIS) terrorist group has reportedly freed hundreds of civilians used by the terrorists as human shields while retreating in northern Syria, media reports said.
A source from the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which pushed Daesh out of the city of Manbij this week, told AFP on Saturday that some of the civilians were able to escape while "others were freed".
The SDF, an Arab-Kurdish alliance, launched an assault in May on Manbij, on a key supply route of the terrorists between the Turkish border and Raqqa.
The Daesh terrorists seized around 2,000 civilians as they fled Manbij on Friday, using them as protection against air strikes en route to town of Jarabulus, on the Turkish-Syrian border.
"Among the civilians taken by ISIL there were people used as human shields but also many who chose voluntarily to leave the town due to fear of reprisals" by the SDF, Head of the so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights Rami Abdel Rahman said.
The terrorists, who have suffered a string of losses in Syria and Iraq, have often staged mass abductions when they come under pressure to relinquish territory they hold.
ISIL has also booby-trapped cars and carried out suicide bombings to slow advances by their opponents.
According to the Observatory, 437 civilians, including more than 100 children, were killed in the battle for Manbij and surrounding territory.
Around 300 SDF fighters died, along with more than 1,000 extremists, it said.
