Reports: US drone strike kills 2 senior Al Qaeda leaders in Syria

U.S. Forces carried out a drone strike Thursday which reports say killed two senior Al Qaeda operatives in near Idlib, Syria.

Maj. Beth Riordan, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) confirmed in an emailed statement to American Military News, “U.S. forces conducted a strike against Al Qaeda in Syria (AQ-S) in the vicinity of Idlib, Syria, October 15. AQ-S continues to present a threat to America and our allies.”

Riordan did not provide specifics of the Al Qaeda targets of the Thursday strike. Fox News reported the strike targeted two senior Al Qaeda operatives and was coordinated by the U.S. military’s elite Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC).

Charles Lister, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute (MEI), on Thursday, tweeted, “BREAKING – Senior #AlQaeda operatives Abu Dhar al-Masri & Abu Yusuf al-Maghrebi (both expelled/defected from Huras al-Din) have been killed in a U.S. drone strike outside Arab Said in #Idlib. They’d been wanted by #HTS too.”

Abu Dhar al-Masri had been a ringleader in fueling an internal dispute within Huras al-Din in June 2019, when ultra-hardliners refused to allow HaD fighters to contribute towards fighting #Assad on frontlines run by #HTS (& influenced by #Turkey).

He & others were expelled.

— Charles Lister (@Charles_Lister) October 15, 2020

https://americanmilitarynews.com/2020/10/reports-us-drone-strike-kills-2-senior-al-qaeda-leaders-in-syria/