ISIS Militants Kill at Least 18 People in an Attack on Villagers Collecting Truffles in Eastern Syria

 A Syrian vendor displays truffles at a market in Aleppo on February 28, 2024. (AFP)
A Syrian vendor displays truffles at a market in Aleppo on February 28, 2024. (AFP)
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ISIS Militants Kill at Least 18 People in an Attack on Villagers Collecting Truffles in Eastern Syria

 A Syrian vendor displays truffles at a market in Aleppo on February 28, 2024. (AFP)
A Syrian vendor displays truffles at a market in Aleppo on February 28, 2024. (AFP)

ISIS militants attacked villagers collecting truffles in eastern Syria on Wednesday, killing at least 18 people and leaving dozens injured and missing, opposition activists and pro-government media said.

The attack against the truffle hunters was one of the deadliest strikes by the ISIS group in the area in more than a year. It took place in a desert area near the town of Kobajeb in the eastern province of Deir Ezzor that borders Iraq. Some of the truffle gatherers may have been kidnapped, opposition activists said.

Despite the militant group’s defeat in Syria in March 2019, ISIS sleeper cells still carry deadly attacks in Syria and neighboring Iraq, across a wide swath of territory where the extremists had once ruled.

Since truffle hunters work in large groups in remote areas, ISIS militants in previous years have repeatedly preyed on them, emerging from the desert to kill many and abduct others to be ransomed for money.

Separately, in Syria's opposition-held northwest, an al-Qaeda-linked group released more than 400 detainees from its jails after days of protests demanding their freedom.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, said that the attack Wednesday in Deir Ezzor left 18 people dead and 16 wounded. It said about 50 people were missing and might have been kidnapped by ISIS. Twelve vehicles were torched.

The Observatory said the dead included four members of the pro-government National Defense Forces, which had sent reinforcements to the area.

The pro-government Dama Post media outlet said the death toll was as high as 44 and that some 13 vehicles used by the truffle farmers were set fire to and destroyed.

The disparate casualty figures could not be immediately reconciled. Different death tolls in Syria are not uncommon in the immediate aftermath of deadly attacks.

The truffles are a seasonal delicacy that can be sold for a high price and many in Syria, where 90% of the population lives below the poverty line, go out to collect them.

In February 2023, ISIS militants killed dozens of civilians and security officers in an attack on truffle hunters in the deserts of central Syria.

In Syria's Idlib province, the recent death of a member of an opposition faction, allegedly while being tortured in a jail run by the al-Qaeda-linked Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, or HTS, has sparked days of protests in various parts of the province.

Protesters have demanded the release of prisoners, including during a rally Tuesday night at an HTS jail in the town of Daret Azzeh that drew warning gunfire from HTS fighters, further angering protesters. The protesters also have demanded the resignation of HTS head Abu Mohammed al-Golani.

Golani responded with concessions, including the release Wednesday of 420 detainees from HTS jails, according to several opposition activists, including the Observatory.

Anti-HTS sentiments had been rising since a wave of arrests by the group of senior officials within the organization, which was previously known as Nusra Front before changing its name several times and distancing itself from al-Qaeda.

In August, the group announced that its co-founder and top official Maysara al-Jubouri, better known as Abu Maria al-Qahtani, was arrested over misuse of social media. Al-Jubouri, an Iraqi citizen, had been a longtime al-Qaeda official who fought against US forces in Iraq following the 2003 US-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.

In 2011, he was one of several al-Qaeda officials who moved to Syria, months after the country’s ongoing deadly conflict began. There have been reports that al-Jubouri will be released soon.

In the weeks that followed al-Jubouri’s arrest, dozens of HTS officials and members of other factions allied with them were detained and allegedly tortured in jails run by al-Golani loyalists for allegedly giving intelligence information to the US-led coalition that has, over the years, killed top al-Qaeda commanders in drone strikes in different parts of Syria.



Yemen's Houthis Shoot Down What Witnesses Say Was a US Drone, American Military Investigates

Supporters of Yemen's Houthis attend an anti-Israel rally in solidarity with Gaza and Lebanon in the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa on November 1, 2024. (Photo by Mohammed HUWAIS / AFP)
Supporters of Yemen's Houthis attend an anti-Israel rally in solidarity with Gaza and Lebanon in the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa on November 1, 2024. (Photo by Mohammed HUWAIS / AFP)
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Yemen's Houthis Shoot Down What Witnesses Say Was a US Drone, American Military Investigates

Supporters of Yemen's Houthis attend an anti-Israel rally in solidarity with Gaza and Lebanon in the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa on November 1, 2024. (Photo by Mohammed HUWAIS / AFP)
Supporters of Yemen's Houthis attend an anti-Israel rally in solidarity with Gaza and Lebanon in the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa on November 1, 2024. (Photo by Mohammed HUWAIS / AFP)

Yemen's Houthi militants shot down what bystanders described as an American drone early Friday, potentially the latest downing of a US spy drone as the militants continue their attacks on the Red Sea corridor.
The US military acknowledged the videos circulating online showing what appeared to be a flaming aircraft dropping out of the sky and a field of burning debris in what those off-camera described as an area of Yemen's al-Jawf province. The military said it was investigating the incident, declining to elaborate further.
It wasn't immediately clear what kind of aircraft was shot down in the low-quality night video, The Associated Press said.
The Houthis have surface-to-air missiles capable of downing aircraft such as the Iranian missile known as the 358. Iran denies arming the group, though Tehran-manufactured weaponry has been found on the battlefield and in seaborne shipments heading to Yemen for the Shiite Houthis despite a United Nations arms embargo.
The Houthis have been a key component of Iran's self-described “Axis of Resistance" during the Mideast wars that includes Lebanon's Hezbollah, Hamas and other militant groups.
The Houthis did not immediately claim responsibility for downing the aircraft. However, it can take their fighters hours or even days after an incident before they acknowledge it.
Since the Houthis seized the country’s north and its capital of Sanaa in 2014, the militants have shot down MQ-9 Reaper drones in Yemen in 2017, 2019, 2023 and 2024. The US military has declined to offer a total figure for the number of drones it has lost during that time.
Reapers, which cost around $30 million apiece, can fly at altitudes up to 50,000 feet (15,240 meters) and have an endurance of up to 24 hours before needing to land. The aircraft have been flown by both the US military and the CIA over Yemen for years.
The Houthis have targeted more than 90 merchant vessels with missiles and drones since the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip started in October 2023. They seized one vessel and sank two in the campaign that has also killed four sailors. Other missiles and drones have either been intercepted by a US-led coalition in the Red Sea or failed to reach their targets, which have included Western military vessels as well.
The militants maintain that they target ships linked to Israel, the US or the UK to force an end to Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza. However, many of the ships attacked have little or no connection to the conflict, including some bound for Iran. The tempo of the Houthi sea attacks also has waxed and waned over the months.
In October, the US military unleashed B-2 stealth bombers to target underground bunkers used by the Houthis.