US-backed Kurdish and Arab fighters have opened a new front against the "Islamic State" (ISIS) terrorist group in northern Syria, thrusting into a strategic jihadist pocket along the Turkish border, a monitor said on Wednesday.
US-led coalition aircraft carried out intense air strikes on the ISIS-held town of Manbij, 30 kilometers west of the Euphrates, in support of the offensive, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
"The campaign for Manbij began on Tuesday," Observatory chief Rami AbdelRahman told AFP.