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Another official of the al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorist group Hurras al-Din was killed in northwestern Syria in a United States drone strike on February 21.
In a statement claiming responsibility for the strike, the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) said that the official, Wasim Tahsin Bayraqdar, was a senior leadership facilitator of the terrorist group.
It added that the strike was a part of its “ongoing commitment, along with partners in the region, to disrupt and degrade efforts by terrorists to plan, organize, and conduct attacks against civilians and military personnel from the U.S., our allies, and our partners throughout the region and beyond.”
The deadly strike took place close to the town of Sarmada in the northern Idlib countryside. Footage from the scene indicates that Bayraqdar’s vehicle was targeted with an AGM-114R-9X, a version of the laser-guided Hellfire missile with a kinetic warhead made up of pop-out blades instead of explosives.
The missile is typically launched from MQ-9 Reaper combat drones. Multiple such drones were spotted over Idlib before and after the strike.
“We will relentlessly pursue and destroy terrorist threats, no matter their location, in order to protect our homeland and our allies and partners,” said CENTCOM commander Gen. Michael Erik Kurilla commenting on the strike.
Syrian media revealed that Bayraqdar is the brother of the director of the Awqaf [religious endowments] in the Syrian capital, Damascus.
This was the third U.S. strike to target members of Hurras al-Din since the group declared its dissolution on January 28, citing the victory of the Syrian revolution and the fall of the Assad regime as the reason to cease operations in the country.
On January 30, a strike killed Muhammad Salah al-Za’bir who was described by CENTCOM at the time as “a senior operative” of Hurras al-Din. Later on February 16, a senior Libyan “finance and logistics official” of the group was killed by another strike. Both attacks took place in Idlib.
Since its formation in 2018, Hurras al-Din clashed on several occasions with Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which led the offensive that removed Bashar al-Assad from power last December. HTS also declared its dissolution earlier in the week after its leader, Ahmad al-Sharaa, was appointed the president of Syria for the transitional period.
killing rivals of their ultra-zionist puppet jolani to solidify his rule.
they just outlived their usefulness now that jewlani is head of state and controls the government.
blah blah blah… ya gotta be a moshlom. go eat a goats @nus.
cleaning up the moshlom dirt. lol
from the river to the sea, kyll the moshloms while they flee
israel will not allow competition . anyone that shows leadership abilities that asks or speaks obvious questions must be removed . the zionist project continues ….
killed an al qaeda leader? more like killed a shia or an alawite.
hezbollah was able to stop israel on the battlefield. did they lose the will to fight? didn’t want to many civilian deaths on their side? too many spies paid off by uncle schlomo who told them where their leaders were and didn’t want to be assasinated?
either way it sucks.