Battles have continued to rage on along Turkey's border between the Islamic State in Syria and the Levant (ISIL) fighters and Syrian Kurds as anti-ISIL coalition's military chiefs prepare to meet in the US capital.
Activists said the self-declared jihadist fighters fought their way on Monday into central Kobane in heavy clashes with the Syrian border town's Kurdish defenders, a day before a Washington DC meeting of the US-led coalition against the ISIL.
The offensive resulted in the ISIL claiming half of Kobane, despite more than three weeks of US-led air strikes in Syria aimed at stopping them and nearly a month after the fighters began their assault on the town.
US and Saudi fighter jets targeted seven sites around Kobane, the US military said on Monday, including ISIL staging posts used to try to cut Kobane from the outside world.