The US-led coalition in Syria launched a drone strike in the Idlib province, targeting a car, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported on Thursday.
The SOHR said the strike killed the person driving the car, who was believed to be a leader of Hurras al-Din, an al-Qaeda affiliate. Hurras al-Din just announced on Tuesday that it was dissolving, saying its goals were completed by the regime change that ousted former President Bashar al-Assad.
Other reports said the victim of the strike was a member of the Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP), a Uyghur Muslim group that seeks to establish an Islamic State in China’s Xinjiang region. The TIP’s Syria branch helped in the offensive led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) that ousted Assad, and some of its senior members have been absorbed into the new Syrian military.
The damage to the vehicle suggested it was hit by a US-made AGM-114R9X Hellfire missile, nicknamed the “Flying Ginsu,” which shreds its target with razor-sharp blades instead of using an explosive warhead. If the strike was launched by the US, it would be the first known US airstrike under the Trump administration.
The SOHR said the strike marked the second in Idlib launched by the US-led coalition this month. On January 15, a few days before Trump was inaugurated, a coalition drone reportedly fired three rockets at a motorcycle, killing the rider and a boy who was walking nearby.
The Syrian Network for Human Rights said the motorcycle rider was a member of Hurras al-Din, while SOHR described him as a former member of ISIS. SOHR said a third person was killed in the attack.
