Tense standoff spells endgame for Islamic State fighters in Syria

BAGHOUZ, Syria -- The collection of tents was largely silent on a sunny winter Monday afternoon. Few people were visible, but the few out and about were calm: Two men in long robes and pants walked slowly together through the grass, a woman leisurely came out of her tent to look around, a man on a motorcycle drove toward the river.

This is the last speck of land held by the Islamic State group -- a patch along the Euphrates River in eastern Syria where an estimated 300 militants are mixed in with hundreds of civilians, refusing to surrender and trying to negotiate an exit with the U.S.-backed forces surrounding them.

An Associated Press team got a rare glimpse of the IS-held settlement, standing on a rooftop about a half-mile away during a media tour to the front lines organized by the Syrian Democratic Forces. The roof looked out over a flat, green landscape with scattered palm trees, to an earthen berm and a line of pickups put up by the militants at the edge of the camp.

At one point, gunfire crackled in the distance. An SDF commander on the roof with a number of fighters said it isn't always so quiet. Only days earlier the militants surprised the soldiers with an attempted night raid. The SDF can't assault the site or call in airstrikes because of the civilians, he said, adding his fighters have seen the militants moving civilians around at gunpoint as protection.

"They try a psychological war. But that is it! The war is over, and we won," said the commander, who spoke on condition he be identified only by his nom de guerre, Baran, in line with SDF rules.

The tense standoff by the village of Baghouz is the endgame for the militant group controlling since 2014 a vast stretch of territory across Syria and Iraq -- at one point nearly from Aleppo to Baghdad -- and ruling for years, aspiring to create an enduring and expanding jihadi state. The 300 militants in the pocket may include high-level figures and are believed to hold hostages.

Activists said a truce in place has been extended for five days as of Sunday. A person familiar with ongoing deliberations said the group has asked for an exit through a corridor to the rebel-held northwestern province of Idlib and demand to be allowed to leave along with the civilians. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak about the talks, which he described as taking place indirectly.

Baran said the militants had sent messages with civilians they allowed to out up until last week, asking for a corridor out to Idlib and Turkey. Since Wednesday, no civilians came out of the pocket. The SDF denies any negotiations are taking place

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an activist group monitoring the civil war in Syria, said another request by IS to be evacuated to neighboring Iraq was also rejected. IS released 10 SDF fighters it had been holding Sunday, but it was not clear what, if anything, the extremists would get in return, the Observatory said. Soldiers reported some of their colleagues have also been released since.

The SDF appears to be aiming to wait the militants out. "They don't have supplies in the area they are in that would last for a week or more," said Baran, the commander.