Kurdish fighters backed by US-led air strikes held back jihadists attacking a Syrian border town Saturday, following an international outcry at the murder of a British hostage by the Islamic State group.
Dozens of militants with the Islamic State (IS) organisation were reported dead in the latest American-led coalition air raids.
The dusty town of Kobane on the frontier with Turkey has become a key battleground between IS jihadists and their opponents, who include local Kurdish fighters as well as the United States and its allies.
Fighting raged Saturday as IS militants kept up their offensive to seize Kobane, activists said.
Mortar shells pounded the town as smoke rose above it, according to an AFP team on the Turkish side of the border.
S-led strikes late Friday targeted at least four sites on the outskirts of Kobane, destroying some military material, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights group said.
Five jihadists were killed in the air raids near the border town, as well as 30 more around Shadadi in northeastern Syria, according to the Britain-based group, which monitors the conflict.
IS militants fired at least 80 mortar rounds into Kobane town on Friday.
But activist Mustafa Ebdi said Kurdish fighters had been buoyed by their success at holding off the assault so far, noting that the IS jihadists had hoped to capture the town by Saturday for the Muslim Eid al-Adha festival.
“So far they have failed to enter the town.”
IS began its advance towards Kobane, also known as Ain al-Arab, on September 16 to cement its grip over a long stretch of the border.
It has prompted a mass exodus of residents from the town and the surrounding countryside, with some 186,000 fleeing into Turkey.
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