AKCAKALE, Turkey—A quick and successful offensive by Kurdish fighters and allied rebels in a northern Syrian town has boosted a U.S.-backed effort to choke off Islamic State's supply routes.
Emboldened by this week's recapture of Tal Abyad on the Turkish border, Syrian Kurdish fighters and allied rebels said their next target is Raqqa, Islamic State's main stronghold about 50 miles south of Tal Abyad. On Monday, these fighters said they had already begun to advance southward toward Raqqa, reaching the town of Ain Issa, only about 30 miles away.
"Now that we have just completed clearing Tal Abyad and the surrounding villages, we will move to liberate Raqqa in the near future. It's our mission," said Shervan Darweesh, a spokesman for rebel groups allied with the Syrian Kurdish militia known as YPG.
The YPG's political affiliate, the Democratic Union Party or PYD, has ruled the three Kurdish-majority enclaves along the Turkish border in northern Syria since regime forces withdrew from the area in 2012.
The latest advance came amid stepped-up U.S. airstrikes in the region around Raqqa, Kurdish and Syrian fighters said. The U.S. carried out 23 airstrikes near Raqqa over the past two weeks, according to the U.S. military's Central Command. That was more than double the number in the same area in all of May.
Tal Abyad's capture is an important milestone for the U.S.-led coalition fighting Islamic State from the air in northern Syria and its allies on the ground. It is part of efforts to cut off the group's supply lines not just to the city of Raqqa but into neighboring Iraq, where the coalition has struggled to stem recent gains by Islamic State.
The advance recalled a similar battle six months ago in the Syrian Kurdish city of Kobani, where U.S. airstrikes helped YPG and a smaller alliance of Syrian rebels seize the town. However, it was a much longer and bloodier fight that lasted about four months.
On Tuesday, fighters were clearing mines and booby-traps in the Tal Abyad area, Mr. Darweesh said.
Abdulrahman al-Salih, a spokesman for one of the non-Kurdish Syrian rebel groups in the alliance, the Raqqa Revolutionaries, said Islamic State, also known as ISIS, retreated from Tal Abyad on Monday after very little fighting.
He said the YPG-rebel coalition surrounded the town starting Sunday, while airstrikes "prevented ISIS from sending any resupply convoys from Raqqa."
The offensive cut an important supply line for Islamic State across the porous Turkish border nearby.
Mr. Salih said that most Islamic State fighters withdrew south to Raqqa, or handed themselves over to Turkish forces policing the border. Turkish officials also said at least two Islamic State members had been detained after handing themselves over.
The Islamic State rout followed recent gains by the group that suggested efforts to contain the extremist group were failing. Last month, the militants captured Palmyra, the central Syrian town with a trove of ancient ruins, and Ramadi, the capital of Iraq's largest province.
Thousands of people fled in recent days as they anticipated a violent offensive, swarming Turkey's border and cutting holes through a fence to get through when officials briefly closed the crossing. More than 23,000 Syrians have fled into Turkey since early June, mostly fleeing the Tal Abyad offensive, Turkish and United Nations officials said.
Mohammad Nour Alakraa and Dana Ballout in Beirut contributed to this article.
Write to Ayla Albayrak at ayla.albayrak@wsj.com. and Dana Ballout at dana.ballout@wsj.com.
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