‘IS uses chemical gas against Syrian rebels’

The attack targeted Turkey-backed rebels who have for days been besieging the Islamic State-controlled town of al-Bab, a major goal in Ankara’s “Euphrates Shield” operation to push the jihadists away from the Syrian side of the Turkish border. 

According to the state-run Anadolu agency, the Islamic State rocket attack occurred in the Haliliye area. The army did not specify where the attack had taken place. “Twenty-two rebels were observed to have symptoms of being exposed to chemical gas in their eyes and bodies as a result of the rocket fired by  Daesh,” media reports quoted the army statement as saying, using an Arabic acronym for Islamic State. 

The rebels were transferred to a hospital in Turkey’s border province of Kilis on suspicion of chemical poisoning after complaining of constant sickness and severe headaches, Hurriyet newspaper reported on its website. Turkish AFAD emergency relief teams conducted various tests on them to check for traces of chemical, other media reported. 

In the last 24 hours around al-Bab, Turkish jets have destroyed four Islamic State targets in the Anifah region, and one Turkey-backed Syrian rebel has been killed and 14 wounded in clashes, the military said. On Thursday, three Turkish soldiers were killed in an air strike in Syria which the army said it believed was carried out by the Syrian air force.