US-led coalition captures a senior Islamic State member in Syria

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BEIRUT (AP) — A U.S.-led coalition captured a senior member of the Islamic State group in northwest Syria on Wednesday, state media and a war monitor reported. It was not immediately clear if the man is the IS supreme leader.

Abu Hafs al-Qurayshi, an Iraqi citizen and IS commander, was detained during a pre-dawn operation that included landing troops from helicopters in the town of Atmeh, near the Turkish border. Another Iraqi citizen was killed, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The U.S. military did not respond to a request for comment.

The Observatory said the man captured had a French-speaking woman with him, and it was not immediately clear if she was taken by the U.S. force or by Syrian security forces who later cordoned the area.

Two years ago, IS announced that a man called Abu Hafs al-Hashemi al-Qurayshi was named as its new leader after Turkish authorities killed his predecessor.

Syrian state TV on Wednesday quoted an unnamed security official as saying the Iraqi man targeted in the operation is known as Ali, adding that his real name is Salah Noman. It said Noman was living in an apartment with his wife, son and mother. It said he was killed in the raid.

There was no immediate clarification for the difference in names reported by state media and the war monitor.

U.N. counter-terrorism chief Vladimir Voronkov told the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday that while multiple leaders of the Islamic State have perished in the past few years, “the group has managed to retain its operational capacity.”

“There is no indication that the killing of its deputy leader in charge of operational planning, which resulted from counter-terrorism operations in Iraq in March, will be any different,” he said, citing unnamed countries as saying the extremist group may recover from such a loss within six months.

Acting U.S. Ambassador Dorothy Shea made no mention of Wednesday’s arrest, but said the Trump administration has intensified counter-terrorism operations globally, including targeting the IS, also known as ISIL, and al-Qaida's leadership, infrastructure, and financial networks.

IS broke away from al-Qaida more than a decade ago and attracted supporters from around the world after it declared a so-called caliphate in 2014 in large parts of Syria and Iraq. Despite its defeat in Iraq in 2017 and in Syria two years later, IS militants still carry out deadly attacks in both countries and elsewhere.

Al-Qurayshi is not the real name of IS leaders but comes from Quraish, the name of the tribe to which Islam’s Prophet Muhammad belonged. IS claims its leaders hail from the tribe, and “al-Qurayshi” is part of their nom de guerre.