BFF-50 Iraq says it killed 45 IS jihadists in Syria strike

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Iraq says it killed 45 IS jihadists in Syria strike

BAGHDAD, June 23, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Iraq said Saturday it had killed 45
jihadists from the Islamic State group, including senior members, in an air
strike in eastern Syria, the second such operation in less than a month.

Iraqi F-16 fighter jets carried out a “successful strike targeting a
meeting of Daesh (IS) leaders” on Friday in the Hajin region, in the eastern
Syrian province of Deir Ezzor, a military statement said.

Among those killed, it said, were a senior member of the jihadists’
“ministry of war”, his deputy, a local commander and a media official. There
was no independent confirmation.

Three houses linked by an underground tunnel were also destroyed, it said,
adding that the air strike was carried out based on “intelligence” and at the
request of Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi.

Hajin, about 50 kilometres (30 miles) from Iraq’s border, is the largest
populated hub still under IS control in Syria.

Last month the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights that
monitors the Syrian war said that at least 65 senior IS members live in
Hajin.

The town has been surrounded since the end of last year by the Syrian
Democratic Forces, a US-backed alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters, the
monitor says.

Iraq’s air force has carried out several strikes on IS-held territory in
Syria since April, including one targeting “the headquarters of IS terrorist
gang leaders” in Hajin on May 24.

The following day Iraq released a video showing a strike on a huge building
surrounded by palm trees and a wall which then collapsed.

IS declared a cross-border “caliphate” in Syria and Iraq in 2014, seizing a
third of Iraq during a sweeping offensive.

The jihadists have since lost much ground to separate counter-offensives by
Syrian and Iraqi forces as well as US-led operations, and the jihadist
presence has been confined to a few holdouts in Deir Ezzor.

In December the Iraqi government declared victory over IS but the military
has continued regular operations targeting mostly desert areas along the
porous Syrian border.

BSS/AFP/ARS/1951 hrs