At least 40 fighters on both sides were killed as Syrian Kurdish fighters and ISIS militants clashed in the northern Syrian city of Kobani , a monitoring group said Saturday . Kurdish fighters belonging to the People 's Protection Units , known as YPG , have been locked in a death struggle with ISIS fighters for the border city , in the shadow of Turkey , with 100,000 desperate Syrian Kurds fleeing to Turkish territory . Five ISIS suicide bombers blew themselves up using cars and explosive belts near the besieged Kurdish city , according to the London-based opposition group , Syrian Observatory for Human Rights . Clashes also erupted west of Kobani , with ISIS using tanks to advance and firing at least 110 shells on various areas of the city , the monitoring group said Saturday . At least 10 YPG fighters and 25 ISIS militants were killed during the clashes , according to the SOHR . YPG fighters also carried out several operations in the neighborhood of Botan Sharqi on the southern outskirts of Mashtah Nour hill near Kobani , the monitoring group reported . The U.S.-led coalition , meanwhile , conducted five airstrikes in Kobani , including one against an ISIS tank west of the city , the SOHR said . The coalition started operations in September . ISIS , the Sunni Muslim extremist militant group , has been fighting to take Kobani for more than two months , hoping to add it to the territory it has already captured in parts of Syria and Iraq for what it calls its new independent Islamic nation . Syria has been embroiled in a three-year civil war , with government troops battling ISIS and other rebels elsewhere , leaving Kobani 's ethnic Kurds to defend the city . Airstrikes by the U.S. and its allies , part of a larger U.S.-led coalition effort against ISIS in the region , intermittently take out ISIS targets in the area . The Syrian Kurdish fighters , part of the People 's Protection Units , , have ties to the Kurdistan Workers ' Party , or PKK , which has fought a 30-year guerrilla war against the government of Turkey , where about 20 % of the population is Kurdish . Turkey , the European Union and the United States consider the PKK a terrorist organization .
At least 10 Syrian Kurdish fighters and 25 ISIS militants reported killed in clashes in Kobani . Five ISIS suicide bombers blow themselves up near northern Syrian city . West of Kobani , ISIS militants advance with tanks and shelling .