Women recruits prepare to join Syria’s Raqqa battle

Women fighters danced to Kurdish songs in a village in northern Syria on Wednesday after completing their military training to join the battle against Islamic State.

The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an alliance of local militias supported by a U.S.-led coalition, had given the 210 women a 15-day course in armed combat.

Trainers taught the women weapons handling, tactics and first aid.

“The goal … is to stand up against Daesh, to stand up to them and tell them that the woman is strong,” said new recruit Layla Hussein, using the Arabic acronym for Islamic State.

Jihan Sheikh Ahmed, the SDF spokeswoman for the Raqqa campaign, said the women would be mainly deployed to the battlefront against Islamic State in Raqqa.

Read the whole story from Reuters.

Featured image courtesy of Flickr