Syria

MURSITPINAR, Turkey (AP) -- The U.S.-led coalition intensified its aerial bombardment of Islamic State positions Thursday in the Syrian border town of Kobani as the extremist group fought street battles with Kurdish forces and reportedly rushed in reinforcements.

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) -- An American aid worker threatened with beheading in Syria had researched the region and knew the dangers, but he believed the good he could accomplish through his relief organization outweighed the risk, his friends said Wednesday.

BEIRUT (AP) -- U.S.-led coalition warplanes struck Islamic State fighters in Syria attacking a town near the Turkish border for the first time Saturday, as well as positions in the country's east, activists and a Kurdish official said.

BEIRUT (AP) -- U.S.-led airstrikes targeted Syrian oil installations held by the militant Islamic State group overnight and early Thursday, killing nearly 20 people as the militants released dozens of detainees in one of their strongholds, fearing further raids, activists said.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama said Tuesday the participation of five Arab nations in airstrikes against militants in Syria "makes it clear to the world this is not America's fight alone."

NEW YORK (AP) -- For President Barack Obama, the participation of five Arab nations in airstrikes against militants in Syria marked an unexpected foreign policy victory as he plunges the U.S. deeper into a military conflict in the Middle East that he has reluctantly embraced.

DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) -- Syria said Tuesday that Washington informed President Bashar Assad's government of imminent U.S. airstrikes against the Islamic State group, hours before an American-led military coalition pounded the extremists' strongholds across northern and eastern Syria.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Republican-controlled House voted grudgingly Wednesday to give the administration authority to train and arm Syrian rebels as President Barack Obama emphasized anew that American forces "do not and will not have a combat mission" in the struggle against Islamic State militants in either Iraq or Syria.

American journalist Peter Theo Curtis has returned home to the United States, two days after being freed by a Syrian extremist group.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Islamic State militant group is holding hostage a young American woman who was doing humanitarian aid work hostage in Syria, a family representative said Tuesday. The 26-year-old woman is the third American known to have been kidnapped by the militant group.