UK, France carry out joint strike on ISIL target near Syria’s Palmyra

The ISIL (ISIS) organization appears to be resurgent after a period of relative dormancy in the area, so the United Kingdom’s Ministry of Defense announced today that its aircraft flew in tandem with France to attack an underground facility in Syria.

The ministry’s statement, which uses the Arabic abbreviation ISIL, stated that “Royal Air Force aircraft have successfully attacked Daesh in a joint operation with France.”

The area, which is located north of Palmyra’s historic site, was said to be “devoid of any civilian habitation.”

In a string of attacks in Syria over the course of nine days, the US military reported killing or capturing about 25 ISIL fighters in late December.

The US military’s Middle East operations were concluded in a statement released on Tuesday by the Central Command (CENTCOM), which oversees the organization’s operations there.

Following the widespread US strikes against the group six days later and the killing of two US soldiers and a civilian interpreter by an ISIL attacker in Syria on December 13, the campaign began.

In the interim, Turkiye’s government announced on Wednesday that it had arrested more than 100 ISIL suspects in nationwide searches as the organization’s continued signs of regional intensification after a brief period of relative dormancy.

According to Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya, Turkish authorities detained 125 suspects from 25 different provinces, including Ankara, during the arrests.

Following a deadly shootout on Tuesday between Turkish police and suspected ISIL members in the northwestern city of Yalova, the operation was the third of its kind in less than a week during the holiday season.

Three Turkish police and six suspected ISIL members, all of whom are Turks, were killed in that incident. In a coordinated crackdown, Turkish security forces made 357 suspected ISIL members.

ISIL attacked an Istanbul nightclub during New Year’s Eve celebrations in 2017, killing 39 people as the group still held large swaths of neighboring Syria and Iraq before being defeated on the battlefield. Turkish police reported that the prosecutor’s office had learned that operatives were “planning attacks against non-Muslims in particular” this holiday season.

ISIL is still active in Syria, where it shares a 900km (560 miles) border, and has launched numerous attacks there since last year’s ouster of former president Bashar al-Assad.