Al-Qaeda Kidnaps Nearly 200 Kurds from North Syria

193 Kurds Taken in Latest Raid on Kurdish Village

Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) has raided the Kurdish village of Qabasin in Aleppo Province, kidnapping at least 193 civilians and marching them off to AQI-held territory.

AQI has been fighting with Kurdish militias in the northeast of the country for months now, but in Aleppo, where the Kurds are a smaller minority, they have been regularly targeted by Islamist fighters.

AQI also attacked another Kurdish town in Aleppo, Ras al-Ayn, killing at least 15 civilians there after chasing off the small Kurdish militia trying to guard it.

Aleppo Province remains contested among several factions, with AQI and the Islamic Front holding most of the region, but the Syrian military retaining a foothold in the city itself. The Kurdish villages, to the extent they are still left, seem too far outside of Kurdish territory to be defensible, and are likely to be slowly evacuated by residents in favor of the relative safety of the areas along the Iraqi Kurdistan border.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.