Without identifying the location of the nighttime operation, the US military claimed in a statement on Sunday that American forces had killed two members of the ISIL (ISIS) armed group in eastern Syria.
Two ISIS authorities were killed during an “effective helicopter strike in eastern Syria at 2:57 am (23:57 GMT),” as per an assertion from US Headquarters (CENTCOM), another name for ISIL.
Its early evaluations of the operation stated there were no civilian casualties.
The CENTCOM release mentioned that one of the slain had the first name “Anas” and was associated with the group’s lethal “plotting and facilitation operations in eastern Syria.”
Less than two weeks have passed since ISIL declared that its leader Abu Hassan al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi, had perished in the fighting. According to the US, al-Qurayshi was murdered in an operation carried out by rebel forces in October in the southern city of Deraa.
After his predecessor, Abu Ibrahim al-Qurayshi, was killed in a US operation in February in northwest Syria’s Idlib region, Abu Hasan al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi assumed control of the organization. However, little was known about him.
Al-Qurayshi is thought to be a nom de guerre used by different ISIL leaders.
An international military coalition led by the US could destroy the ISIL group, which had taken large portions of land in Syria and Iraq in 2014. Despite losing its last bastion in 2019, the armed organization can still carry out devastating assaults in Syria and Iraq because of its sleeper cells.
As indicated by CENTCOM representative Joe Buccino, “ISIS [ISIL] keeps on representing a threat to the security and dependability of the area.”
The demise of these ISIS [ISIL] officials will prevent the terrorist group from continuing to plan and carry out actions that destabilize the Middle East.
As per the Syrian Observatory for Common Freedoms, it was the “main” hostile to ISIL activity in something like three weeks.
However, Al Jazeera could not independently verify the claim that Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters participated in the raid.
Some 900 US troops support SDF forces in Syria as part of a global coalition battling ISIL remnants. ISIL fighters have regularly been their targets, mainly in Kurdish-controlled areas in northeastern Syria.
US servicemen are at risk due to Turkish operations in northern Syria targeting SDF forces, and Syria is in danger of becoming unstable.
Following Turkish attacks inside Syria, US soldiers and SDF fighters temporarily halted cooperative patrols in northeastern Syria.
The People’s Protection Units (YPG), which make up the majority of the SDF, were held responsible by Turkey for the six-death Istanbul bombing on November 13.
The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has carried out a brutal armed uprising in the southeast of the nation, is thought of by Ankara as having links to the YPG.
Turkey, the US, and the European Association, who are partners in NATO, have all marked the PKK as a “psychological oppressor” association.