ISIS Appears to Lose Ground in Fight for Its Raqqa Base<br />Over the weekend, American military officials said the United States had strengthened its contingent of Syria-based forces to help deter clashes<br />around Manbij, a town in northern Syria near the Turkish border, which Kurdish militia members helped capture from the Islamic State in August.<br />By RICK GLADSTONE and MAHER SAMAANMARCH 6, 2017<br />The Islamic State appeared to suffer an important setback on Monday when American-backed militia fighters in Syria seized the main route<br />that connects Raqqa, the Islamic State’s de facto capital, to its territory in southeastern Deir al-Zour Province.<br />The impending assault also represents a test of the complex array of competing forces<br />in Syria fighting the Islamic State — forces that also could turn on one another.<br />In a sign that the Islamic State is preparing for a possible retreat, male civilians in Raqqa were recently ordered to start dressing similarly to the group’s fighters, according to the Syrian Observatory<br />and a second monitoring group known as Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently.<br />They include rebel Kurdish and Arab militia members trained<br />and equipped by the United States, Turkish soldiers, the Syrian forces of President Bashar al-Assad and his militia allies supported by Russia and Iran.<br />By blending into the population, Islamic State fighters not only improve their escape prospects,<br />but make distinguishing civilians from combatants difficult for the American-backed coalition of aerial forces hitting targets around Raqqa.
