Jabhat al-Akrad: 7,000[55] Syriac Military Council 2,000+ (2015)[56] 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 Foreign intervention in behalf of Syrian rebels U.S.-led intervention against ISIL The Rojava–Islamist conflict, a major theater in the Syrian civil war, started after fighting erupted between the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) and Islamist rebel factions in the city of Ras al-Ayn.

[74] On 28 January, Arab tribesmen attacked the homes of Christian Armenians and Assyrians in the village of ad-Dalawiyah (25 kilometres (16 mi) south of Qamishli) and attempted to steal their harvest.

[76] On 17 July, Kurdish fighters expelled the jihadists from the town of Ras al-Ayn after a night of fighting[77] and soon after took control of the border crossing with Turkey.

[78] Islamist forces retreated from Ras al-Ayn to Tal Half, Asfar and Najar which were under rebel control.

[83] By the end of July 2013, IS and al-Nusra expelled Jabhat al-Akrad and the YPG from the border town of Tell Abyad after a week of fighting which displaced thousands of Kurdish civilians.

[87] On 26 September, rebels from the Free Syrian Army and Trotskyists of the Leon Sedov Brigade[88] joined IS in clashes with YPG forces around the town of Atma, on the Turkish border.

[94] On 6 November, in Hasakah province, the YPG took over two villages west of Tall Tamer, on the highway to Aleppo, after clashes with IS, Jabhat Al-Nusra and allied rebel groups.

[96] On 13 November, following major gains by the YPG, the PYD announced plans to create an autonomous transitional government to run the Kurdish-majority northeast of Syria.

In Raqqa province, rebel fighters launched domestically manufactured rockets on the villages of Kandar and Abdi Kawi which were under the control of the YPG.

[99] On 26 February, the YPG announced it had halted all its military operations in the Kurdish-controlled regions but warned its enemies that it would respond to every hostile action on Kurdish soil.

[107] On 11 March, IS captured the town of Sîrîn[108] and attacked the Al-Hadaya Hotel in the city of Qamishli with suicide bombs, killing nine Kurdish civilians.

[110] On 13 March, IS (according to local sources) captured the Qereqozak Bridge and some strategic areas near the Tomb of Suleyman Shah in Kobanê after clashes with Kurdish fighters.

[111] On 14 March, Kurdish sources claimed that the YPG and allied forces killed 35 IS fighters in clashes in the countryside of southern Kobanî Canton, which erupted after IS launched an unsuccessful attack towards the Serriin silos.

[117] Despite YPG control of the hills around Sirrin, IS forces, backed up by tanks, captured two grain silos and seized the village of Tal al-Bawgha.

[118] On 29 May, it was reported that IS killed dozens of civilians in raids on several villages in the Ras al-Ayn region of Al-Hasakah province, with the retrieval of at least 15 bodies, including seven children.

[121] On 4 July, using weapons captured in Iraq, IS seized the villages of Zor Maghar, Al-Zyara, and Bayadiyah, near the city of Kobanî, after three days of fighting with YPG forces.

[122] On 9 July, IS advanced towards Kobanî from the east, forcing the YPG to withdraw from the villages of Abdi, Kwi, Kendal, Kri and Sor.

[135] On 28 September, after violent clashes with the Kurdish forces of the YPG, IS militants captured the villages of Kenana, Qadaa, and Hamadaneh in the Tel Kocher (Yarubiyah) countryside.

On 31 October, Iraq-based Peshmerga troops crossed into Syria via Turkey to aid in the defense of the border city of Kobane.

On 31 July 2015, clashes erupted between YPG and al-Nusra forces in the south of the Efrin Canton, targeting the town of Cindires.

The clashes resulted in YPG forces advancing and capturing Castello Road, a key rebel supply line in the rebel-held Eastern Areas of Aleppo city.

On 16 February 2016, the SDF, supported by airstrikes from the US-led coalition, launched an offensive to capture the strategic city of al-Shaddadi from IS.

On 11 September 2016 Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, the renamed al-Nusra Front, fired over 20 mortar shells at the town of Jindires in the southwestern Afrin Canton, destroying several residential buildings and causing a number of casualties, mostly women and children.