(Washington) The US military announced Friday that it had carried out a raid in coordination with Iraqi security forces that resulted in the death in late August of four leaders of the Islamic State (IS) group in western Iraq, including the head of operations in that country.
“This operation targeted ISIS leaders and served to disrupt and degrade ISIS’s ability to organize and conduct operations,” the U.S. military’s Middle East Command (Centcom) said, adding that a total of 14 ISIS members were killed in the raid on August 29.
Two days after the raid, the US military announced that seven American soldiers had been wounded in a large-scale operation carried out with Iraqi security forces against ISIS in the west of the country.
Iraqi intelligence services then claimed that the operation came after “more than two months of surveillance using human and technological means”, which had enabled the location of “four shelters” used by IS.
They also said it was likely that “high-ranking leaders” were among those killed in the raid.
According to Centcom, the four leaders of the organization in Iraq killed are Ahmad Hamid Hussein Abd-al-Jalil al-Ithawi, head of operations in Iraq; Abu Hammam, head of operations in the west of the country; Abu-Ali al-Tunisi, head of technical development; and Shakir Abud Ahmad al-Issawi, head of military operations in western Iraq.
Iraq declared “victory” over ISIS in late 2017, but jihadist cells remain active in the country and continue to sporadically attack army and police personnel, particularly in rural and remote areas outside major cities.
The United States deploys about 2,500 troops in Iraq and nearly 900 in Syria, as part of the international coalition created in 2014 to fight the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group. The alliance includes troops from several other countries, including France and Great Britain.
“Centcom remains committed to ensuring the defeat of the Islamic State, which continues to threaten the United States, our allies and partners, and regional stability,” Centcom chief Gen. Erik Kurilla said in the statement.