Pentagon says drone strike near Syria's Idlib targeted al-Qaeda official
CENTCOM fired a drone missile at at least one jihadi official near Idlib today in the first such strike in recent months.
The United States military targeted an al-Qaeda official with a drone strike in northwest Syria on Monday, the Pentagon said.
Pentagon press secretary John Kirby told reporters the strike was carried out near Syria’s Idlib province but offered no further details. The strike was carried out near the town of Binnish, according to local reports. Kirby said the military had no indication of civilian casualties as of Monday afternoon.
Such US drone strikes have been relatively common in Syria’s Islamist opposition-held northwest in recent years, but Monday’s targeted killing followed a lull over recent months.
Agence France-Presse cited the head of the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights as saying the strike killed two jihadi officials, one of Tunisian and the other of either Yemeni or Saudi origin. US Central Command, which oversees operations in the region, did not return Al-Monitor’s request for comment by publication time.
