BAGHDAD — The U.S.-led coalition conducted a series of airstrikes targeting a gathering of Islamic State leaders near the northern city of Mosul, a senior U.S. defense official said Saturday.
The airstrikes on Friday night destroyed a convoy consisting of 10 Islamic state armed trucks, said the defense official.
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“We cannot confirm if ISIL leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was among those present,” he said.
Al-Baghdadi, an ambitious Iraqi militant believed to be in his early 40s, has a $10 million U.S. bounty on his head. Since taking the reins of the group in 2010, he has transformed it from a local branch of al-Qaida into an independent transnational military force, positioning himself as perhaps the pre-eminent figure in the global jihadi community.
Despite the airstrikes by the U.S.-led coalition, Sunni militants have continued to carrying out bombings targeting Iraqi security forces and civilians.
A suicide truck bomber struck the convoy of a top Iraqi police officer killing eight people, including the ranking official, authorities said Saturday, in an attack that bore the hallmarks of militants from the Islamic State group.
The late Friday attack happened when the suicide attacker drove his bomb-laden truck into the convoy of police Lt. Gen. Faisal Malik al-Zamel, who was inspecting forces in the town of Beiji north of Baghdad, police said. The blast reportedly killed al-Zamel and seven other officers, while wounding 15 people.
Meanwhile on Saturday, a series of bombings in and around Baghdad killed at least 43 people, with the deadliest blast hitting the city’s sprawling Shiite district of Sadr City, killing 11 people and wounding 21.
There has been an uptick in the number of bombings blamed on Sunni militants in Baghdad, the capital, and mostly targeting Shiites, feeding sectarian tensions in the city, as the security forces of the Shiite-led government battle the Sunni militants of the Islamic State group to the west and north. More recently, the attacks targeted Shiite pilgrims marking Ashoura, the highlight of the sect’s religious calendar.
No one claimed responsibility for the attack in Beiji, 155 miles north of Baghdad, but suicide bombings have long been the signature style of Sunni militants.
Shiite Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, recognizing al-Zamel’s standing, led mourners at al-Zamel’s funeral on Saturday and a top army officer, Gen. Abdul-Wahab al-Saadi, vowed to avenge his death.
A U.S.-led coalition has been launching airstrikes on Islamic State militants and facilities in Iraq and Syria for months, as part of an effort to give Iraqi forces the time and space to mount a more effective offensive.
On Friday, President Obama authorized the deployment of up to 1,500 more American troops to bolster Iraqi forces.
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