While they’ve fought some battles over it, ISIS has had a significant presence in the Yarmouk Refugee Camp in southern Damascus since April. That is to end under a UN deal which will give ISIS fighters and their families safe passage out of the area.
Yarmouk, a huge Palestinian refugee camp which before the war had effectively become its own neighborhood in Damascus, has been the subject of considerable fighting throughout the civil war, and its Palestinian population has mostly fled abroad. ISIS took it hoping to have a foothold near Damascus.
Ultimately, however, the camp wasn’t a great base of operations, and they were keen to get their fighters out of metro Damascus and back into the Caliphate territory itself. Syria was eager to be rid of them too, which led to a rare UN-brokered deal between the two sides.
The ISIS forces will be put on buses and taken into ISIS territory. Though there’s no confirmation on where that will be, early reports are they will be heading to Raqqa, or ISIS territory in the Homs Province.
USA is ordering its killers to retrench so that they can be used later.