Coalition strike kills IS fighters planning attacks in Sweden, US, and Saudi Arabia

The US-led coalition also carried out air strikes against an Islamic State group who were plotting attacks in Sweden.

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The US-led Coalition have killed six Islamic State (IS) members involved in planning and facilitating operations targeting Saudi Arabia, the United States, and Sweden, the coalition said on Tuesday. One of them was a foreign fighter from Belgium.

Munawwar al-Mutayari, a Syrian-based IS member planning external attacks to be carried out in Saudi Arabia, was killed by a coalition kinetic strike on April 24, the US-led coalition said in a statement.

Additionally, a Belgian foreign fighter, Soufiane Makouh, who came to Syria to plan attacks against the US, was killed by a kinetic strike on June 2.

Makouh, born on May 1, 1993, was listed as a terrorist by Belgian authorities in November 2016 while the French government froze his economic resources.

Moreover, the US-led coalition also carried out air strikes against an IS group who were plotting attacks in Sweden.

“On June 12, Coalition forces conducted a kinetic strike against Simak, a Da’esh [Arabic acronym for IS] intelligence official linked to a terror cell plotting attacks in Sweden,” a statement read.

“Two additional individuals directly associated with the Sweden attack plot, Abu Awf and Abu-Quddamah, were killed on June 24,” it continued, adding that “Swedish attack cell member Sharif al-Ragab was killed on June 26.”

It is unclear which Swedish attack plan the US-led coalition refers to.

Rakhmat Akilov caught on CCTV fleeing the scene of an attack in Stockholm, Sweden on April 7, 2017. (Photo: Polisen/TT)
Rakhmat Akilov caught on CCTV fleeing the scene of an attack in Stockholm, Sweden on April 7, 2017. (Photo: Polisen/TT)

On April 7, 2017, Rakhmat Akilov, a 39-year-old rejected asylum seeker born in the Soviet Union and a citizen of Uzbekistan, killed five people in a truck attack in Stockholm.

IS never claimed responsibility for the attack.

Moreover, in 2016, Aydin Sevigin was convicted for plans to carry out an IS-inspired suicide bombing on Swedish soil using a homemade pressure-cooker bomb.

“With its conventional forces under heavy pressure in Syria, Da’esh is desperately seeking to remain relevant through operations that threaten all the nations of the world,” Brig. Gen. Brian Eifler, director of operations for Combined Joint Task Force - Operation Inherent Resolve, said.

“The Coalition and its partners will continue to deny Da’esh safe havens in Syria and Iraq in order to disrupt the terrorist group’s capabilities to plan, coordinate, and carry out attacks on the nations of the world.”

IS has almost entirely lost its grip in Syria and Iraq, but still holds some territory in Syria that is shrinking due to operations by the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces and Damascus.

Moreover, it is carrying out hit and run attacks in disputed territories taken over from Kurdish Peshmerga by Iraqi forces in October following the independence referendum last year. Due to a security vacuum, IS cells are resurgent in these areas.

On Friday, IS reframed its network of global affiliates, Iraq and Syria, which previously consisted of 22 provinces (wilayat), to just two provinces, Wilayat al-Iraq, and Wilayat al-Sham (Syria), according to terrorism expert Charlie Winter.

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany