THIS AIN’T NO PARTY: Thousands believed still inside last IS pocket.
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces have been trying to flush jihadists from their last desert holdout in the village of Baghouz near the Iraqi border since January.
At the time, Mazloum Kobani, the SDF’s top commander, estimated that the operation would take one month.
Thousands of men, women and children, as well as suspected jihadists, have poured out of Baghouz in recent weeks.
The numbers have baffled the SDF and prompted them to pause the operation several times.
SDF spokesman Kino Gabriel told a news conference Sunday that according to the latest group that quit the pocket, “an estimated 5,000 people” are still holed up inside.
He cautioned, however, that the SDF has not been able to verify that figure.
Those fleeing the enclave have previously reported widely inconsistent figures on the number of people still inside, ranging from thousands to a few hundred.
Gabriel said there was no clear timeline for the end of the operation, but estimated that it may take several more days before IS is driven from its last pocket.
The real tragedy is that none of this would have been necessary if Obama hadn’t dismissed ISIS as “the jayvee” when the group was still small enough to be dealt with quickly.