American Fighting With Kurds Killed in Islamic State Battle: Officials

An American fighting with Kurdish forces against the Islamic State group in Syria has been killed in battle, authorities said Wednesday, likely the first U.S. citizen to die fighting alongside them against the extremists.

Keith Broomfield of Massachusetts died June 3 in a battle in the Syrian village of Qentere, which is near the border town of Kobani, said Nasser Haji, an official with a group of Kurdish fighters known as the YPG. He had joined the YPG on Feb. 24 under the nom de guerre Gelhat Raman, Haji said.

Haji did not elaborate on the circumstances of Broomfield's death, nor did he know the man's hometown.

State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke confirmed Bloomfield's death, but declined to provide any details about the circumstances. He said the U.S. was providing consular assistance to his family.

Broomfield's mother, Donna, told NBC News that her other son told her that Keith had died.  

"I didn't want him to go but I didn't have a choice in the matter," she said. 

Donna Broomfield, who lives in Westminster, Massachusetts, said that her son had left to fight around four months ago and that while there was "a little bit of texting" after he first arrived, lately she had heard "nothing."

"I'm waiting for his body to come back," she added.

The fight against the Islamic State group has attracted dozens of Westerners, including a number of Iraq war veterans who have made their way back to the Middle East to join Kurdish fighters, who have been most successful against the extremist group.

Many are spurred on by Kurdish social media campaigners and a sense of duty rooted in the 2003 U.S.-led military invasion of Iraq. And while the U.S. and its coalition allies bomb the extremists from the air, Kurds say they hope more Westerners will join them on the ground to fight.

Previously, a British citizen, an Australian and a German woman have been killed fighting with the Kurds.

Backed by U.S.-led coalition airstrikes, Kurdish YPG fighters in Syria have successfully pushed back Islamic State group militants from Kobani and scores of nearby villages. More recently, they have closed in on the Islamic State-held town of Tal Abyad near the Turkish border. The town is the Islamic State group's main access point to Turkey from Raqqa, the group's de facto capital in Syria.

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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