The Pentagon is the headquarters building of the United States Department of Defense in Washington DC
By Gary Raynaldo DIPLOMATIC TIMES
WASHINGTON DC – A military ground raid by U.S. special operations forces in northern Somalia killed a number of Islamic State members, including Bilal-al-Sudani, a senior ISIS leader, the Pentagon said Thursday. “On January 25, on orders from the President, the U.S. military conducted an assault operation in northern Somalia that resulted in the death of a number of ISIS members, including Bilal-al-Sudani, an ISIS leader in Somalia and a key facilitator for ISIS’s global network,” U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said in a statement. Al-Sudani was an ISIS leader in Somalia and a key facilitator for ISIS’s global network, Austin added. No civilians were harmed as a result of this operation, he said.
United States Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin at the Pentagon in Washington D.C. (Credit: US DOD)
“Al-Sudani was responsible for fostering the growing presence of ISIS in Africa and for funding the group’s operations worldwide, including in Afghanistan. This action leaves the United States and its partners safer and more secure, and it reflects our steadfast commitment to protecting Americans from the threat of terrorism at home and abroad.”
-U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin
He added in the statement that the Defense Department is grateful “to our extraordinary service members as well as our intelligence community and other interagency partners for their support to this successful counterterrorism operation.”
U.S. Has Been Focused on Al Shabaab Terror Group in Somalia
The US operation against ISIS in Somalia is surprising given that the Pentagon has mainly focused on al-Shabaab fighters, the dominant terror group in the Horn of Africa nation. Just last Friday, a U.S. airstrike against Al Shabaab killed 30 jihadists northeast of Mogadishu near Galcad, Somalia, AFRICOM confirmed. The strike occurred approximately 260 km northeast of Mogadishu where Somalia National Army forces were engaged in heavy fighting following a complex, extended, intense attack by more than 100 al-Shabaab fighters, according to AFRICOM. “At the request of the Federal Government of Somalia and in support of Somali National Army engagements against al-Shabaab, U.S. Africa Command conducted a collective self-defense strike on Jan. 20, 2023”, AFRICOM said in a statement.
U.S. Biden Administration Steps Up Airstrikes in SOMALIA
Source: Wikipedia Commons / American drones such as the remotely piloted General Atomics MQ-1 Predator, have been used primarily by the United States Air Force for counter-terror airstrikes in the Horn-of-African nation Somalia against terror group al-Shabaab.
Somalia remains central to stability and security in all of East Africa, AFRICOM said. On Dec. 23, 2022, a U.S. airstrike against Al Shabaab killed six jihadists in late December northeast of Mogadishu near Cadale, Somalia. In December 2020, the Trump administration ordered the withdrawal of more than 700 U.S. troops from Somalia by early 2021. The Biden administration resumed military activity inside Somalia in the first quarter of 2022. President Biden’s Department of Defense has since been striking hard against Shabaab, al Qaeda’s branch in East Africa. By early June 2022, the Pentagon conducted at least eight airstrikes in Somalia.
