Syrian state media said a US-led anti-jihadist coalition killed an Iraqi leader from the Islamic State group during an operation on Wednesday in the country’s northwest.
“Coalition forces carried out an air drop targeting a house in the town of Atme” in Idlib province, state television cited an unidentified security source as saying.
The operation targeted Iraqi national Salah Numan, known as Ali, who was “a leader in the Daesh (IS) organisation”, the source said, calling him “one of the most dangerous men wanted for his involvement in activating and mobilising IS cells in Syria”.
The coalition has not released any statements about an operation in northwest Syria.
But three witnesses, including the owner of the building where Numan was living, told AFP the raid took place after midnight, reporting the sound of aircraft and gunfire.
State television said coalition forces raided the house where Numan was living with his family and mother, shooting him dead after he jumped from the balcony of their first-floor flat.
An Iraqi security source, requesting anonymity, told AFP that Numan was the brother of a top IS leader who was killed in 2020 in a coalition strike in eastern Syria’s Deir Ezzor province.
Iraqi intelligence led to Wednesday’s operation, the security source said, adding that Numan’s wives were arrested.
Mohammed al-Sheikh, who owns and lives in the building, told AFP that at around 2:30 am (2330 GMT Tuesday), he heard noise and went outside to find coalition forces ordering him to surrender.
“I started calling to my family one by one,” he said, adding that “the translator’s accent was Iraqi”.
Sheikh said the forces blindfolded his family, led them away and took their details including fingerprints.
He said he rented the house to Numan “via a real estate agency and had no connection to him”.
Neighbour Abdel-Qader al-Sheikh said Numan had lived there for two years, adding: “We didn’t have anything to do with him.”
The US-led coalition has often carried out strikes in Idlib targeting IS officials, including a raid announced in June.
Several former IS leaders have been killed in the province, including in coalition strikes.
IS seized swathes of Syrian and Iraqi territory in 2014 during Syria’s civil war, before being territorially defeated in the country five years later.
Its fighters still maintain a presence there, particularly in Syria’s vast desert.
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© Agence France-Presse
