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 A Syrian Christian group representing several NGOs inside and
outside the country said it had verified at least 150 people
missing, including women and the elderly, who had been kidnapped by
the militants.
"We have verified at least 150 people who have been adducted from
sources on the ground," Bassam Ishak, president of the Syriac
National Council of Syria, whose family itself is from Hasaka, told
Reuters from Amman.
Earlier the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said
90 were abducted when the militants carried out dawn raids on rural
villages inhabited by the ancient Christian minority west of Hasaka,
a city mainly held by the Kurds.
The United States condemned the attacks in Hasaka and called for the
immediate and unconditional release of the civilians taken captive.
The State Department said hundreds of others remain trapped in
villages surrounded by Islamic State fighters in violence that has
displaced more than 3,000 people.
"ISIL’s latest targeting of a religious minority is only further
testament to its brutal and inhumane treatment of all those who
disagree with its divisive goals and toxic beliefs," spokeswoman Jen
Psaki said in a statement, using an acronym for Islamic State.
 Psaki added that Syrians are also threatened by President Bashar
al-Assad's intensified bombings and air strikes in an "unrelenting
campaign of terror."
Syrian Kurdish militia launched two offensives against the militants
in northeast Syria on Sunday, helped by U.S.-led air strikes and
Iraqi peshmerga.
This part of Syria borders territory controlled by Islamic State in
Iraq, where it committed atrocities last year against the Yazidi
religious minority.
Islamic State did not confirm the kidnappings. Supporters posted
photos online of the group's fighters in camouflage attire looking
at maps and firing machine guns. The website said the photos were
from Tel Tamr, a town near where the Observatory said the abductions
occurred.
Many Assyrian Christians have emigrated in the nearly four-year-long
conflict in which more than 200,000 have people have been killed.
Before the arrival of Kurds and Arab nomadic tribes at the end of
the 19th century, Christians formed the majority in Syria's Jazeera
area, which includes Hasaka.
Sunday's offensive by Kurdish YPG militia reached within five km (3
miles) of Tel Hamis, an Islamic State-controlled town southeast of
Qamishli, the Observatory said.
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At least 14 IS fighters died in the offensive, in which Assyrians
fought alongside Kurds, it added. Eight civilians were also killed
in heavy shelling by the Kurdish side, which seized several Arab
villages from Islamic State control.
Last year, Islamic State fighters abducted several Assyrians in
retaliation for some of them fighting alongside the YPG. Most were
released after long negotiations.
RELIEVING PRESSURE
Military experts said militants were trying to open a new front to
relieve pressure on Islamic State after several losses since being
driven from the Syrian town of Kobani near the border with Turkey.
"Islamic State are losing in several areas so they want to wage an
attack on a new area," said retired Jordanian general Fayez Dwiri.
Since driving IS from Kobani, Kurdish forces, backed by other Syrian
armed groups, have pursued the group's fighters as far as their
provincial stronghold of Raqqa.
A resident of Hasaka, jointly held by the Syrian government and the
Kurds, said hundreds of families had arrived in recent days from
surrounding Christian villages and Arab Bedouins were arriving from
areas along the border.
"Families are coming to Hasaka seeking safety," said Abdul Rahman
al-Numai, a textile trader said by telephone.
(Additional reporting by Oliver Holmes in Beirut, Doina Chiacu in
Washington; Editing by Tom Heneghan and Eric Walsh)
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