To understand why Kobane is doomed, you only have to stand on a nearby hillside and watch as the Islamic State maniacs tighten their grip. A few hundred yards away, the besieged town was in flames again yesterday as the jihadis fired mortar bombs into densely-packed neighbourhoods. Every explosive thud and pillar of smoke signifies yet more deaths, as the men, women and children of the stricken Syrian frontier town desperately fight to the last. It is a deeply uneasy feeling to witness this life-and-death struggle against a terrorist state while standing in Turkey, a country that regards itself as European.
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EXCLUSIVE report and photographs by Sam Greenhill and Jamie Wiseman on the border near Kobane
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Local military forces positioned on the hills overlooking Kobane but cannot act without Turkish political will
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The Turkish military is effectively contributing to the ISIS stranglehold by blocking much-needed reinforcements
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Thousands of Kurds have descended on the area to try and cross the border and support their Syrian kin
If ISIS succeeds in taking Kobane, the terror group will have seized an unbroken 125-mile stretch of border with @placeholder.