Ankara launched its assault targeting the Kurdish YPG militia after the abrupt withdrawal of 1,000 US troops from northern Syria in early October, a move Kurds deemed a betrayal by Washington, their partner in fighting Islamic State.

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In a rare public dissent with US President Donald Trump, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu offered humanitarian aid to the "gallant Kurdish people" on Oct. 10, saying they faced possible "ethnic cleansing" by Turkey and its Syrian allies.

Hotovely told the Knesset on Wednesday that the offer had been taken up.

"Israel has received many requests for assistance, mainly in the diplomatic and humanitarian realm," she said. "We identify with the deep distress of the Kurds, and we are assisting them through a range of channels."

Syrian Kurdish officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

Hotovely did not elaborate on the Israeli assistance, other than to say that during "dialogue with the Americans..., we state our truth regarding the Kurds...and we are proud of our taking a stand alongside the Kurdish people."

Israel has maintained discreet military, intelligence and business ties with the Kurds since the 1960s, regarding the minority ethnic group – whose indigenous population is split between Iraq, Turkey, Syria and Iran – as a buffer against shared adversaries.

Chief among those today are Iranian-sponsored forces deploying close to Israel's borders, including within Syria.

"Israel indeed has a salient interest in preserving the strength of the Kurds and the additional minorities in the north Syria area as moderate and pro-Western elements," Hotovely said.

"The possible collapse of the Kurdish hold in north Syria is a negative and dangerous scenario as far as Israel is concerned. It is absolutely clear that such an event would bring about a bolstering of negative elements in the area, headed by Iran."

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Hours after the deal was announced, the Turkish defense ministry said that the United States had told Turkey the withdrawal of Kurdish militants was complete from the "safe zone" Ankara demands in northern Syria.

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There was no need to initiate another operation outside the current area of operation at this stage, the ministry said in a statement, effectively ending its military offensive that had begun on Oct. 9, drawing widespread criticism.

The agreement follows a US-brokered truce which expired on Tuesday and underlines the dizzying changes in Syria since US President Donald Trump announced the withdrawal of American troops two weeks ago ahead of Turkey's cross-border offensive against the Kurds.

The Russia-Turkey agreement struck in the Black Sea resort of Sochi endorses the return of Syrian President Bashar Assad's forces to the border alongside Russian troops, replacing the Americans who had patrolled the region for years with their former Kurdish allies.

Video: Reuters

Under the pact between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the two countries said Russian military police and Syrian border guards would start removing the YPG 30 km (19 miles) from the Turkish border on Wednesday.

Six days later, Russian and Turkish forces will jointly start to patrol a narrower, 10 km (6 miles) strip of land in the "safe zone" that Ankara has long sought in northeast Syria.

US Vice President Mike Pence voiced support for the establishment of the safe zone.

"We may well give the international community an opportunity to establish a safe zone between Turkey and the Kurdish population in Syria that will ensure peace and security," Pence told a Heritage Foundation gala in Washington.

Earlier on Tuesday, Jim Jeffrey, the senior US diplomat on Syria, dismissed the Sochi deal and questioned whether the Russians could get the YPG to leave the territory it covers.

"It's full of holes," he told a congressional hearing. "All I know it will stop the Turks from moving forward. Whether the Russians will ever live up to their commitment, which is very vague, to ... get the YPG out of their areas, I don't know."

After six hours of talks with Erdoğan in Sochi, Putin expressed satisfaction at decisions he described as "very important, if not momentous, to resolve what is a pretty tense situation which has developed on the Syrian-Turkish border."

A senior Turkish official described it as an "excellent" deal which would achieve Turkey's long-held goal of a border strip cleared of the YPG, which Ankara regards as a terrorist organization because of its links to insurgents inside Turkey.

Last week's US-brokered deal was limited to the central part of the border strip between the Syrian towns of Tel Abyad and Ras al-Ain, where Turkish forces had focused their military offensive.

Under the deal with Moscow, the length of border which the YPG would be required to pull back from is more than triple the size of the territory covered by the US-Turkish accord, covering most of the area Turkey had wanted to include.

"The outcome of the Putin-Erdoğan meeting in Sochi today indicates that Erdoğan has become a master of leveraging the US and Russia against each other to maximize Ankara's gains," Soner Cagaptay, director of the Turkish program at the Washington Institute said in a tweet.

"Turkey got the safe zone it wanted all this time."

Some 300,000 people have been displaced by Turkey's offensive and 120 civilians have been killed, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based war monitor. It said on Sunday 259 fighters with the Kurdish-led forces had been killed, and 196 Turkey-backed Syrian rebels. Turkey says 765 terrorists but no civilians have been killed in its offensive.

Pence received a letter from Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) commander Mazloum Kobani on Tuesday saying their forces had withdrawn "from the relevant area of operations" under that deal, Pence's spokeswoman Katie Waldman said.

However, before flying to Russia Erdoğan had said hundreds of Kurdish fighters remained near to Syria's northeast border despite the truce demanding their withdrawal. Earlier he had said the fighting might resume if promises by Washington were not kept.

The US withdrawal from northern Syria has been criticized by US lawmakers, including some of Trump's fellow Republicans, as a betrayal of Kurdish allies who have helped the United States fight Islamic State in Syria.

Turkey sought a "safe zone" along 440 km (270 miles) of border with northeast Syria, but its assault focused on the two border towns in the center of that strip, Ras al-Ain and Tel Abyad.

Syrian and Russian forces have already entered two border cities, Manbij and Kobani, which lie within Turkey's planned "safe zone" but to the west of Turkey's military operations.

Erdoğan has said he could accept the presence of Syrian troops in those areas, as long as the YPG are pushed out.

Russia is an ally of Assad. Turkey has backed rebels seeking to oust Assad during Syria's more than eight-year-long civil war but has dropped its once frequent calls for him to quit.

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Since Trump pulled US troops out of the way following a phone call with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the incursion has opened a major new front in the eight-year Syrian war and drawn fierce criticism internationally.

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"We have one of three choices: Send in thousands of troops and win Militarily, hit Turkey very hard Financially and with Sanctions, or mediate a deal between Turkey and the Kurds!" Trump said in a Twitter post on Thursday.

"I hope we can mediate," Trump said when asked about the options by reporters at the White House.

Without elaborating, Trump said the United States was "going to possibly do something very, very tough with respect to sanctions and other financial things" against Turkey.

On Friday morning, Turkish jets and artillery struck around Syria's Ras al-Ain, one of two border towns that have been the focus of the offensive. Gunfire could also be heard inside the town, said a Reuters journalist in Ceylanpinar, on the Turkish side of the border.

He said a convoy of 20 armored vehicles carrying Syrian rebels entered Syria from Ceylanpinar on Friday. Some of them made victory signs, shouted "Allahu akbar" and waved Syrian rebel flags as they advanced towards Ras al-Ain.

Some 120 km (75 miles) west, Turkish howitzers resumed shelling near the Syrian town of Tel Abyad, a witness said.

Turkey's Defense Ministry said that in overnight operations the Turkish military and its Syrian rebel allies killed 49 Kurdish fighters. It says it has killed 277 fighters in total.

The ministry said one Turkish soldier was killed in a clash on Thursday during the offensive, which is targeting the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), led by the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia.

Kurds said they were resisting the assault. At least 23 fighters with the SDF and six fighters with a Turkish-backed Syrian rebel group had been killed, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the war.

NATO member Turkey says the operation is necessary for border security against the YPG militia, which it designates a terrorist group because of ties to militants who have waged a decades-old insurgency in southeast Turkey in which more than 40,000 people have been killed.

Ankara has also said it intends to create a "safe zone" for the return of millions of refugees to Syria.

The SDF have been the main allies of US forces on the ground in the battle against Islamic State since 2014. They have been holding thousands of captured IS fighters in prisons and tens of thousands of their relatives in detention.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian called for an emergency meeting of the coalition of more than 30 countries created to fight Islamic State.

SDF forces were still in control of all prisons with Islamic State captives, a senior US State Department official said in a briefing with reporters on Thursday.

The United States has received a high-level commitment from Turkey on taking responsibility for Islamic State captives but had not yet had detailed discussions, the official said.

US lawmakers have said Trump gave Erdoğan the green light to go into Syria but the official disputed that. "We gave them a very clear red light, I've been involved in those red lights and I know the president did that on Sunday," the official said.

The SDF said Turkish airstrikes and shelling had killed nine civilians. In apparent retaliation by Kurdish-led forces, six people including a 9-month-old baby were killed by mortar fire into Turkish towns, Turkish officials said.

The International Rescue Committee aid group said 64,000 people in Syria have fled since the campaign began. The towns of Ras al-Ain and Al-Darbasiyah, some 60 km (40 miles) to the east, were largely deserted.

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Ankara revealed last weekend that a joint operations center for the proposed zone along Syria's northeastern border is now fully operational.

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Washington and Ankara have been at odds over plans for the region, where the Kurdish YPG militia from the main part of a US-backed force fighting Islamic State. Turkey considers the YPG a terrorist group.

"The agreement which we have reached with the USA is a correct step towards establishing a safe zone and removing the YPG from the east of the Euphrates [river]," Erdoğan told reporters on his way back from meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow.

Erdoğan said that Turkey would not accept delays in the plan, comparing it to an earlier deal with Washington to remove YPG fighters from the northern Syrian city of Manbij, which Ankara accused Washington of delaying.

"We will never tolerate a delay like we saw in Manbij. The process must advance rapidly," Erdoğan was quoted as saying by CNN on Thursday.

The safe zone was proposed last year by US President Donald Trump, who had announced plans to withdraw US special forces from northern Syria but later suspended the plan to ensure that Washington's Kurdish allies would be protected.

Erdoğan said this week Turkish ground troops would enter the planned safe zone "very soon", having warned previously that Turkey would mount a cross-border offensive on its own to clear the YPG militia from its border if necessary.

"All the personnel, the armored carriers, all are on the border. That is, we are in a position to do everything at any moment," Erdoğan was quoted as saying.

Defense cooperation with Russia

On Tuesday, an official in a YPG-led alliance said that the YPG will pull forces and heavy weapons from a strip along Syria's border with Turkey under US-Turkish deals.

The YPG withdrew from the Tell Abyad and Ras al-Ain border positions in recent days, proving it is serious about ongoing talks, the Kurdish-led authority in north and east Syria said.

US support for the YPG has enraged Turkey, which views the militia as a terrorist organization linked to Kurdish insurgents inside the country.

The two countries have also fallen out over Turkey's purchase of Russian S-400 missile defense systems, prompting Washington to begin removing Turkey from its program for manufacturing F-35 jets, which Turkey also planned to buy.

Erdoğan visited an aviation fair with Putin during his visit to Moscow. Asked whether Russia's Sukhoi Su-57 stealth fighter jet and Su-35 aircraft could be among alternatives to the F-35s, Erdoğan said: "Why not? We didn't come here for nothing."

The RIA news agency cited a Russian official as saying on Wednesday that the two countries are discussing the possibility of deliveries of the two aircraft to Turkey.

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Turkey has been running out of patience with the United States, which made an agreement with Ankara to implement a safe zone in northeastern Syria. Erdogan said both Russia and the United States have been told of the operation.

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Following US President Donald Trump's announcement last year of a planned US withdrawal from northern Syria, the two NATO allies agreed to create a safe zone inside Syria along its northeastern border with Turkey that would be cleared of the YPG militia.

The YPG was Washington's main ally on the ground in Syria during the battle against Islamic State, but Turkey sees it as a terrorist organization.

Ankara says that the United States has stalled progress on setting up the safe zone and has demanded that Washington sever its relations with the YPG.

The operation, which would mark the third Turkish incursion into Syria in as many years, was first signaled by Erdogan earlier this year but later put on hold.

"We entered Afrin, Jarablus, and Al-Bab. Now we will enter the east of the Euphrates," Erdogan said on Sunday during a motorway-opening ceremony. "We shared this with Russia and the United States."

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Turkey has been in talks with the United States over the establishment of a safe zone across its border in northeast Syria, where the United States supports the Kurdish YPG militia. Ankara sees the YPG as a terrorist organization.

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In an interview with broadcaster TGRT Haber, Çavuşoğlu also said he hopes an agreement will be reached after talks on Monday with US special envoy for Syria James Jeffrey, who is visiting Turkey.

Ankara wants YPG fighters to withdraw from the border area, while Washington wants guarantees that its Kurdish-led allies in the campaign to defeat Islamic State in Syria will not be harmed.

Çavuşoğlu said on Monday that talks with the United States on the safe zone have slowed, adding that Turkey had told Washington that it should not use the fighting in Syria's northwestern Idlib province as a pretext for disregarding the proposed safe zone further east.

He repeated Turkey's frustration that a deal with the United States for the withdrawal of YPG forces from the town of Manbij had still not been implemented, more than a year after it was agreed, and warned that Turkey will act unilaterally if talks on the safe zone stall.

"If the safe zone is not established and threats towards our country continue, we will launch the operation in the east of the Euphrates," he said.

"The Americans sent Jeffrey and said there were new proposals in the talks that will start today. We hope an agreement can be reached on this. Concrete steps are needed on this now."

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