The US’ key anti-ISIS partners in Syria said on Wednesday that the ISIS detention facilities they guard are coming under attack and that they have been forced to halt anti-ISIS operations, complicating the US military’s efforts to prevent the terror group from reconstituting following the ouster of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
US officials have been scrambling to ensure that the terrorists can’t regroup in Syria and have carried out dozens of airstrikes on ISIS targets in recent days, as dozens of competing factions, including some backed by Turkey, now vie for control in different parts of the country.
But the US’ most important partner there, the SDF, has come under relentless attack by Turkish-backed militants in recent days, raising concerns among US officials and experts about the security of the more than 20 detention facilities and camps holding suspected ISIS members and their families in northern Syria.
The SDF is largely made up of Kurdish fighters from a group known as the Peoples’ Protection Units (YPG), which is considered a terrorist organization by neighboring Turkey.
The SDF’s top commander in Syria, General Mazloum Abdi, told CNN on Wednesday that the SDF has had to begin relocating ISIS detainees because the prisons have been threatened.
“With the increasing threats that faced the city of Manbij, we relocated ISIS detainees from the prisons there to other, more secure detention facilities,” Abdi said.
“As Turkey-backed factions advanced toward the city center, cells launched attacks on detention centers holding both civilians and terrorists,” he added. “Currently, detention centers in both Raqqa and Hasakah are facing similar threats, necessitating enhanced cooperation and additional security measures to protect these sites.”
The SDF has now withdrawn from Manbij altogether following what it is describing as a fragile ceasefire with the Turkey-backed groups, which was brokered with the help of the US on Tuesday.
The fighting has also forced the SDF to halt its anti-ISIS operations, Abdi told Sky News on Wednesday.
“At the moment, joint operations against ISIS are halted, this is not a decision, but a military reality,” he said. “If these attacks persist, joint operations will remain suspended. ISIS is now stronger in the Syrian desert.”
Abdi said that previously, ISIS was hiding, but their activities have now “increased” in areas under SDF control. Additionally, “plans for breaking out from detention centers is also on their agenda,” he added.
An ‘inordinately complex situation’
It is an “inordinately complex situation at the moment” in Syria, said Ian Moss, a former senior State Department official who worked on counterterrorism and is now with the law firm Jenner & Block.
“We absolutely cannot stay out of it,” Moss told CNN. He added that there is “broad bipartisan agreement” that the situation in the camps is “not sustainable.”
A congressional official agreed and noted that “there are still many facilities the SDF is guarding and may be shifting away from as the Turkish strikes increase and [the SDF forces] have to redeploy.”
Senior US officials, including Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff CQ Brown, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken have all spoken with their Turkish counterparts in recent days to underscore the need for communication and deconfliction as Syria undergoes a highly complex political transition.
Blinken is on his way to the region and will visit Turkey later this week where he is likely to raise the attacks by the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army against the US-supported Kurds in northeast Syria.
Further underscoring the chaotic nature of the fighting right now, the SDF downed a US MQ-9 Reaper drone on Monday because they thought it was Turkish, multiple officials told CNN. The MQ9 is remotely piloted by the US Air Force and is capable of conducting surveillance and carrying out offensive strikes.
Asked about the downed drone, an American defense official said that US forces have recovered some of its components and destroyed remaining portions of it.
“US Air Forces Central is actively assessing the actions that led to the incident and will adjust tactics, techniques, and procedures to safeguard US, Coalition, and partner forces and their associated assets,” the official said.
It is not clear what the drone’s mission was at the time it was shot down, but the US has continued conducting anti-ISIS operations in Syria in recent days and carried out dozens of strikes against ISIS targets just one day after Assad’s ouster.
Around 900 American troops remain in Syria as part of an anti-ISIS coalition that includes the SDF, and defense officials have said the US intends to maintain its presence in the country to prevent the terror group from reconstituting.
Austin told reporters in Japan on Wednesday that the US will continue to work with the SDF going forward.
“We have a good relationship with them and I think it will remain that way,” Austin said.
CNN’s Jennifer Hansler contributed reporting.
