Islamic State fighters killed 145 civilians in an attack on the Syrian town of Kobani and a nearby village, in what a monitoring group described as the second worst massacre carried out by the hardline group in that country.
27 people, including foreign tourists, were killed when at least one gunman opened fire on a Tunisian beachside hotel in the popular resort of Sousse, while a suicide bomber blew himself up at a packed Shi’ite Muslim mosque in Kuwait city during the Jumat prayers, killing more than ten people.
A decapitated body covered in Arabic writing was found at a U.S. gas company in southeast France after an assailant rammed a car into the premises, triggering an explosion.
Fighting between the Kurdish YPG militia and Islamic State fighters who infiltrated the town at the Turkish border on Thursday continued into a second day, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group and a Kurdish official said.
A separate Islamic State assault on government-held areas of the northeastern city of Hasaka was reported to have forced 60,000 people to flee their homes, the United Nations said, warning as many as 200,000 people may eventually try to flee.
The attack on the predominantly Kurdish town of Kobani and the nearby village of Brakh Bootan marked the biggest single massacre of civilians by Islamic State in Syria since it killed hundreds of members of the Sunni Sheitaat tribe last year, Rami Abdulrahman, who runs the Observatory, said.
He said 146 civilians had been killed. Kurdish officials said at least 145 had died.
The assault included at least three suicide car bombs. The dead included the elderly, women and children, he said.
The Islamic State fighters were reported to number in the dozens and entered the town in five cars disguised as members of the YPG and Syrian rebel groups.
The Sousse,Tunisia attack was the second major attack in the North African country this year.
“One attacker opened fire with a Kalashnikov on tourists and Tunisians on the beach of the hotel,” said a hotel worker at the site. “It was just one attacker. He was a young guy dressed in shorts like he was a tourist himself.”
Tunisia, which has been hailed as a model of democratic transition since its 2011 ‘Arab Spring’ uprising, is one of the most secular countries in the Arab world. Its beach resorts and nightclubs on the Mediterranean are popular with European visitors.
No one immediately claimed the attack. But Islamist extremists have attacked North African tourist sites before, seeing them as legitimate targets because of their open Western lifestyles and tolerance of alcohol.
Six other people were wounded, the ministry spokesman said.
Sousse is one of Tunisia’s most popular beach resorts, drawing visitors from Europe and neighbouring North African countries. Tourism is also a major source of income for the government.
Tunisia has been on high alert since March, when Islamist militant gunmen attacked the Bardo museum in Tunis, killing a group of foreign tourists in one of the worst attacks in a decade in the North African country.
In Kuwait city,a suicide bomber blew himself up at a packed Shi’ite Muslim mosque during yesterday’s prayers, killing more than ten people, the governor of Kuwait City said.
The Islamic State militant group claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement posted on social media and said it targeted a “temple of the rejectionists” – a term it usually uses to refer to Shi’ite Muslims, whom it regards as heretics.
It was the first suicide bombing attack on a Shi’ite mosque in the small Gulf Arab oil exporter, where Sunnis and Shi’ites live side by side with little apparent friction.
Islamic State on Tuesday urged its followers to step up attacks during the Ramadan fasting month against Christians, Shi’ites and Sunni Muslims fighting with a U.S.-led coalition against the ultra-radical group.
Kuwaiti parliament member Khalil al-Salih said worshippers were kneeling in prayer when a suicide bomber walked into the Imam al-Sadeq Mosque side and blew himself up, destroying walls and the ceiling.
THE NATION
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