Smoke rises following a US-led coalition airstrike on Islamic State group positions, outside Haditha, Iraq, on January 5, 2016. (AP)
BAGHDAD — An Islamic State rocket expert believed to have been involved in an attack that killed a US Marine has died in a drone strike in Iraq, a spokesman said Sunday.
Staff Sergeant Louis Cardin was killed last month by an IS rocket attack that also wounded eight Marines at an artillery position in the Makhmur area of northern Iraq.
“Several hours ago, we killed an ISIL (IS) member believed responsible for the rocket attack that resulted in the death of Sergeant Cardin,” Colonel Steve Warren, the spokesman for the US-led operation against the jihadists, told journalists in Baghdad.
Jasim Khadijah “was an ISIL member and former Iraqi officer,” he said.
He was “a rocket expert, apparently… he controlled those attacks,” Warren said, adding that the strike also killed five other IS fighters and destroyed a drone and two vehicles.
Get The Times of Israel's Daily Editionby email and never miss our top stories
A US Marine salutes at right as soldiers unload the coffin of Marine Corp Staff Sgt. Louis Cardin at Dover Air Force Base, Delaware, on March 21, 2016. (AP/Cliff Owen)
IS overran large parts of Iraq in 2014, but the country’s forces have since regained significant ground with the backing of US-led air strikes and training.
US President Barack Obama repeatedly pledged that there would be no “boots on the ground” to fight IS, but has deployed special forces to Iraq who are carrying out raids targeting the jihadists.
An American special operations soldier was killed last October during a joint raid with Kurdish forces against IS in Hawijah, a northern Iraqi town.
Advertisement
Help us report truthfully on social media
As a multimedia journalist, my job is to take the quality, fact-based journalism produced by The Times of Israel newsroom and make it accessible across every platform — from Instagram posts to podcasts to short-form videos.
This is how many, especially young people, consume news these days. But misinformation is rampant on social media. Our team at ToI produces accurate, responsible short-form reporting on Israel and the Jewish world.
If you believe in the importance of factual social media journalism, please consider joining our reader support group, The Times of Israel Community. Your financial support is essential to sustain responsible multimedia reporting.
We’re really pleased that you’ve read X Times of Israel articles in the past month.
That’s why we started the Times of Israel - to provide discerning readers like you with must-read coverage of Israel and the Jewish world.
So now we have a request. Unlike other news outlets, we haven’t put up a paywall. But as the journalism we do is costly, we invite readers for whom The Times of Israel has become important to help support our work by joining The Times of Israel Community.
For as little as $6 a month you can help support our quality journalism while enjoying The Times of Israel AD-FREE, as well as accessing exclusive content available only to Times of Israel Community members.
Thank you, David Horovitz, Founding Editor of The Times of Israel
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on Google
