Islamic State militants have killed at least 146 civilians during an offensive on Kurdish YPG militia held Syrian town of Kobani, a monitoring group said on Friday.
The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that it was the second largest single massacre of civilians by the Islamic State in Syria, reported Reuters.
"One hundred and forty-six (civilians have been killed) between Kobani and around Kobani. There are still some ISIS inside the city," said Abdel Rahman, who leads the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, according to Voice of America.
The Islamic State group, also referred to as ISIS/ISIL and Daesh in Arabic, launched a two-pronged attack in northern Syria on Thursday in an attempt to recapture lost territories. The jihadist outfit has successfully re-entered the Turkish Syrian border town of Kobani, just months after being driven out of town by the Kurdish YPG militia.
Rahman said the dead bodies of civilians were found in their homes and in the streets, reported Press TV.
"The terrorists knew that they could not stay and control the town in the face of the Kurdish forces. They came just to kill and strike a moral blow to the Kurds," he said.
The Syrian state media and a pro-Kurdish party in Turkey have blamed Turkish government for facilitating the re-entry of Islamic State jihadists into Kobani.
"The Turkish government has supported ISIL ( the Islamic State group) for years. Today's massacre is a part of this support," said Figen Yüksekdağ, the co-leader of the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), adding there was high probability that the militants on Thursday had entered Kobani from Turkey, according to BGN news.
Turkey, however, denied such claims calling them "baseless." The Turkish government said that the militants infiltrated Kobani from Syria's Jarablus city at around 5 a.m. local time (0200GMT) on Thursday. "The claim that the Daesh militants who mounted the suicide attack had entered the region from Turkey does not reflect reality," a government statement said, according to Anadolu Agency.
The Kurdish YPG militia seized control of the strategic town of Tel Abyad in Syria on June 16. The town was previously used as a key conduit for the Islamic State to smuggle weapons and fighters to and from Raqqa, the capital of the self-proclaimed Caliphate.
