(C) Common Dreams
This story was originally published by Common Dreams and is unaltered.
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Airwars [1]
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Date: 2023-05
A 60 year old male civilian was killed by a declared US drone strike on the outskirts of Qurqaniya just before noon on May 3, 2023. US Central Command released a statement that they had targeted a senior Al Qaeda leader without any additional details.
The Syrian Civil Defense (@SyriaCivilDefe) tweeted that a civilian named Lutfi Hassan Masto (Abu Hassan), age 60, was killed by an unidentified drone while grazing sheep on the outskirts of Qurqaniya. The drone strike also resulted in the death of sheep.
US Central Command (CENTCOM) released a statement on May 3rd that “at 1142am local Syrian time on 3 May, US Central Command forces conducted a unilateral strike in Northwest Syria targeting a senior Al Qaeda leader. We will provide more information as operation details become available.”
However, the information provided by CENTCOM has been disputed by local sources. A tweet from Syrian journalist @pressrahhal stated that while “US Central Command claimed targeting a leader it said was prominent in the “Al-Qaeda” organization…the target is the martyr uncle “Lutfi Hassan Masto” at the age of 60, and he is a civilian who has no connection with any organization, neither now nor previously.” Xeber24 News was the only source that referred to “the leader of one of the terrorist organizations” as being killed in the drone strike but did not clarify if it was the same person as the elderly man killed.
Multiple local sources referred to the location of the strike as being on a poultry farm, specifically in the vicinity of “Abu Khalouf poultry farm.”
Aramme News attributed the strike to a MQ9 reconnaissance aircraft.
Airwars will wait for additional details from CENTCOM in order to determine if the targeted Al Qaeda leader is the civilian killed.
The incident occured at 11:42:00 local time.
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[1] Url:
https://airwars.org/civilian-casualties/cs1992-may-3-2023/
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