US military kills senior ISIS fighter, 2 others in Syria

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US military kills senior ISIS fighter, 2 others in Syria

The US military killed a senior fighter with the Islamic State terrorist group and a fellow combatant in a very rare operation inside a part of Syria controlled by the government, and killed two top ISIS officials Thursday in an airstrike, according to two U.S. military officials.

The Wednesday night raid was carried out by U.S. troops who traveled by helicopter into northeast Syria near the village of Qamishli and killed Rakkan Wahid al-Shammri, an ISIS official responsible for smuggled weapons and fighters. A second ISIS fighter was killed, and two others were arrested, the officials said.

According to a senior U.S. military official, Shammri is responsible for the beheading of two female fighters with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces SDF.

The raid was one of the first known to have been carried out by the U.S. military inside territory controlled by President Bashar al-Assad's regime.

The Russian military, which is now aligned with Syrian forces and operates in the area, did not notify the U.S. about the raid in advance, officials said.

The second mission was an airstrike carried out in northern Syria Thursday night that killed Abu Ala, one of the top five ISIS leaders in the world, as well as a second ISIS official who is responsible for prisoner affairs.

The twin operations included a total of 1,000 hours of surveillance over the targets to make sure no civilians would be harmed, the officials said.

No U.S. troops or Syrian civilians were killed or wounded in the operations, officials said. No U.S. equipment was damaged.

Col. Joe Buccino, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command, said in a statement: USCENTCOM is committed to our allies and partners in the enduring defeat of ISIS.