Airstrike Devastates Kobani Hill As Death Toll In Syria From Coalition Campaign Tops 500

These brutal images show the destruction of an Islamic State flag by an American airstrike on a hill near the Syrian town of Kobani. The pictures show militants planting the flag on Tilsehir hill just moments before an airstrike devastates the area close to the Turkish border.

Since they began last month, US-led coalition airstrikes on Syria have killed more than 500 people, mainly Islamic militants, activists said Thursday. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of activists on the ground, said 553 people have been killed since the airstrikes began on Sept. 23, including 32 civilians. The civilians included six children and five women.





http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/10/23/airstrikes-devastate-kobani-hill-as-death-toll-in-syria-tops-500_n_6036088.html?utm_hp_ref=uk

http://www.news.com.au/world/eunuchs-academics-state-islamic-state-isis-cannot-be-a-new-caliphate-without-introducing-a-cruel-cut/story-fndir2ev-1227102510944

THE Islamic State is not a real Caliphate. It has a priest-king. It has large chunks of the holy land. But are its blessed warriors destined to become eunuchs?

According to two academics writing for university discussion site The Conversation, if the Islamic State (IS) really does hope to restore a medieval-style Caliphate, eunuchs are a vital — but missing — ingredient.

They were seen to be the ultimate in loyal, incorruptible public servants and personal guards.

It was important that they be eunuchs as a huge number of women were kept in a Caliph’s palace as a demonstration of his dominance.

“All previous caliphates relied on a special class of bureaucrats to provide stability and statesmanship,” professors Thomas Johnson and Richard Wassersug write. “Those were eunuchs, who were unable to impregnate the women sequestered in the palace. Eunuchs were without family and dependent upon the caliph for support.”

Even if the self-proclaimed Caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi may have unspoken plans to give his most loyal warriors “the snip” once his conquest is complete, he may have problems elsewhere.

A state without a capital will find it hard to raise taxes, pass judgments and enforce the law. Which may explain the current lack of eunuchs.

“Simply stated, if the IS doesn’t build a deeply fortified city and start producing eunuch bureaucrats, it will never have the stability and endurance of historic caliphates,” the article reads. “The best it can hope for is to be recognised as a 21st-century predatory horde.”