US Strikes IS Leadership Twice in 24 Hours

INA-sources
 
 
A weakened and wary Islamic State terror group suffered a new round of setbacks when U.S. forces targeted three key leaders in two operations across northern Syria in a single day.
 
The U.S. confirmed the first operation, announcing that U.S. special forces had conducted a helicopter raid early Thursday near the northeastern village of Qamishli, in an area controlled by forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
 
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), which oversees American forces in Syria and much of the Middle East, said the target of the operation, Rakkan Wahid al-Shammri, was killed and one of his associates was injured. Two other associates were captured.
 
U.S. military and intelligence officials described al-Shammri as a longtime IS operative who played a key role in smuggling weapons and fighters to support the terror group’s operations.
 
 
Later Thursday, the U.S. military delivered what may have been an even bigger blow, launching a precision airstrike just after 6 p.m. local time in northern Syria, killing two more high-ranking IS officials.
 
in a statement shared with VOA, CENTCOM said the strike killed Abu 'Ala, described as one of the terror group's "top five," who served as the deputy leader of ISIS in Syria.
 
A second IS official, Abu Mu'Ad al-Qahtani, said to be responsible for prisoner affairs, was also killed.
 
The airstrike was first reported by Fox News.
 
CENTCOM officials said that the airstrike was the result of "more than 1,000 hours of intelligence collection to each of the two targets" and that initial assessments showed no civilian casualties from the strike.
 
The U.S. strikes against IS came weeks after one of the top U.S. counterterrorism officials said IS has been stuck in "survival mode," unable, for now, to overcome unrelenting counterterrorism pressure from the United States.
 
The terror group is "no longer trying to attack the United States,” National Counterterrorism Center Director Christine Abizaid said last month, pointing to a series of decapitation strikes and arrests, starting with the February raid that led to the death of former IS emir Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi, also known as Hajji Abdallah.
 
The operation, supported by the U.S.-led coalition, also helped dismantle what coalition officials described as "a major ISIS facilitation network both within the camp and throughout Syria."
 
Thursday's strikes against IS, according to some experts, appear to be building successfully on those efforts by exploiting critical intelligence.
 
"Certainly, the two operations show continued U.S. pressure against ISIS elements in Syria. But more importantly, they show what effects the U.S. can generate with a light footprint," Katherine Zimmerman, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, told VOA via text.
 
Source: VOA