US Central Command said on Saturday that its forces launched an additional 10 strikes against ISIS in Syria from February 3 to February 12, an announcement that came after US forces withdrew from a key base in southern Syria.
“US forces struck ISIS infrastructure and weapons storage targets with precision munitions delivered by fixed-wing, rotary-wing, and unmanned aircraft,” CENTCOM said in a press release.
The command said the attacks were part of “Operation Haweye Strike,” a military operation it launched against ISIS following the December 13 attack in Palmyra, central Syria, which killed three Americans, though the gunman was a member of the US-backed Syrian government’s security forces.
“More than 50 ISIS terrorists have been killed or captured and over 100 ISIS infrastructure targets have been struck with hundreds of precision munitions during two months of targeted operations,” the command said.
On Friday, CENTCOM announced that it completed its operation to transfer more than 5,700 detained ISIS members from prison camps in Syria to Iraq. The operation began after the Syrian government, which is led by the al-Qaeda offshoot Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), took control of the camps from the Kurdish-led SDF, which was previously the US’s main ally in Syria.
While the Trump administration is presenting the Syrian government as an ally against ISIS, the transfer of ISIS detainees suggests the US doesn’t actually trust the government to guard them. US officials recently acknowledged to The Wall Street Journal that the Syrian military is “riddled with jihadist sympathizers, including soldiers with ties to al-Qaeda and ISIS and others who have been involved in alleged war crimes against the Kurds and Druze.”
The CENTCOM announcements about the prisoner transfer and additional strikes came after the US withdrew from the Al-Tanf Garrison, a base in southern Syria near the borders of Iraq and Jordan. Members of the Syrian military replaced US forces at the base, and the Syrian government announced on Sunday that its fighters took over another US base in northeast Syria, the al-Shaddadi military base in the Hasakah countryside.
A US official told The New York Times that, following the Al-Tanf withdrawal, 1,000 US troops still remain in Syria, and it’s unclear if the Trump administration will complete a full withdrawal from the country.
