Twenty-two pro-Ankara gunmen operating in Syria were hit by a chemical gas attack from the so-called ‘Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant’ (ISIL) in northern Syria, the Turkish army said on Sunday.

“After a rocket was fired by ISIL, 22 opposition members were observed to have been exposed in their eyes and bodies to chemical gas,” the general staff said in a statement, quoted by the state-run Anadolu news agency.

It said the attack happened in the area of the village of Khaliliya, east of Al Rai in northern Syria.

Turkish media said that the affected Syrian fighters were brought over the frontier to the Turkish border town of Kilis by teams from Turkey’s AFAD emergencies agency.

The reports said that the Turkish emergency workers were equipped with special chemical suits to protect themselves. The Syrians were brought to the main hospital in Kilis where they are currently undergoing treatment.

The Turkish army is backing the Syrian militants in an unprecedented incursion under the claim to root out ISIL militants from the border area and also ensuring there is no Kurdish militia presence.

Source: AFP