US Airstrikes Kill Five IS Members: Syria Monitor

A Syria monitor reported the strikes killed at least five IS members, including a cell leader. The targets included IS infrastructure and weapons sites in provinces like Deir Ezzor, Homs, and Raqa, according to US Central Command..

A Syria monitor said Saturday that at least five Islamic State jihadist group members including a cell leader were killed in US strikes overnight after a deadly attack on American troops last weekend.

US forces said they struck more than 70 IS targets in what President Donald Trump described as "very serious retaliation" for the December 13 attack that killed two US soldiers and a US civilian.

Washington had said a lone gunman from the IS jihadist group carried out the attack in Palmyra, which is home to UNESCO-listed ancient ruins and was once controlled by jihadist fighters.

It was the first such incident since the overthrow of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in December last year, and Syrian authorities said the perpetrator was a security forces member who was due to be fired for his "extremist Islamist ideas".

Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told AFP that "at least five members of the Islamic State group were killed" in eastern Syria's Deir Ezzor province, including the leader of a cell responsible for drones in the area.

A Syrian security source told AFP that the US strikes targeted IS cells in Syria's vast Badia desert including in Homs, Deir Ezzor and Raqa provinces, and did not include ground operations.

Most of the targets were in a mountainous area running north of Palmyra including towards Deir Ezzor, the source said, requesting anonymity.

US Central Command (CENTCOM) said in a statement that the United States "struck more than 70 targets at multiple locations across central Syria with fighter jets, attack helicopters and artillery".

'Intense bombardment'

"The operation employed more than 100 precision munitions targeting known ISIS infrastructure and weapons sites," CENTCOM said, using an acronym for the Islamic State group.

"The Jordanian Armed Forces also supported with fighter aircraft," it added.

A Syrian security official, also requesting anonymity, told AFP that "the bombardment was intense" and lasted around five hours.

"The targets were far from population centres," the official said, adding that no displacement of residents had been reported and government forces had not been ordered to deploy to the targeted areas.

Syria's foreign ministry, while not directly commenting on the strikes, said on X that the country was committed to fighting IS and "ensuring that it has no safe havens on Syrian territory, and will continue to intensify military operations against it wherever it poses a threat".

Trump said in a post on his Truth Social network that the United States was "inflicting very serious retaliation, just as I promised, on the murderous terrorists responsible" for the Palmyra attack.

CENTCOM said that since the attack, US and allied forces have "conducted 10 operations in Syria and Iraq resulting in the deaths or detention of 23 terrorist operatives", without specifying which groups the militants belonged to.

The US personnel who were targeted were supporting Operation Inherent Resolve, the international effort to combat IS, which seized swathes of Syrian and Iraqi territory in 2014.

IS was territorially defeated in Syria in 2019 but still maintains a presence particularly in the country's vast desert.

US forces are currently deployed in Syria's Kurdish-controlled northeast as well as at Al-Tanf near the border with Jordan.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by Asianet Newsable English staff and is published from a syndicated feed)