While our Turkish “allies” sit in their tanks overlooking Kobani and do nothing.

SURUC, Turkey (AFP) — Islamic State jihadists captured the headquarters Friday of Kurdish fighters defending the Syrian border town of Kobani, with a UN envoy warning thousands would likely be massacred if it falls to them.

Outgunned Kurdish militia were struggling to prevent the jihadists closing off the last escape route for civilians still in the area, prompting an appeal for urgent military assistance.

US-led warplanes have intensified air strikes against IS, which has been attacking Kobani for three weeks, but the Pentagon has warned that, without a ground force to work with, there are limits to what can be done.

Neighboring Turkey has so far refrained from any action against the jihadists on its doorstep, despite four straight nights of protests among its own large Kurdish minority that have left 31 people dead.

The jihadists’ advance has brought the front line to just 1.3 kilometers (little more than three-quarters of a mile) from the border.

“The capture of the headquarters will allow the jihadists to advance on the border post with Turkey to the north of the town,” its director Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.

“If they achieve that, they will have the Kurdish forces inside Kobani completely surrounded.”

As fighting raged, an IS militant carried out a suicide car bomb attack to the west of the Kurdish headquarters that killed two defenders, and 10 Kurds were killed in an IS ambush on the south side of town, the Observatory said.