Islamic State leader linked to Paris attacker is killed in Syria strike

An Islamic State leader with “direct” ties to the alleged mastermind of the Paris attacks was among 10 of the group’s higher-ups killed in Syria and Iraq this month, the Pentagon said.

The US military says such strikes are helping to weaken the jihadist group, which captured large parts of Iraq and Syria last year but has recently seen significant setbacks including this week’s loss of Ramadi in Iraq.

Baghdad-based US military spokesman Colonel Steve Warren said Tuesday that French national Charaffe el Mouadan was killed in a US-led coalition strike on December 24. He had been plotting further attacks against the West, Warren said.

“He was a Syrian-based ISIL member with a direct link to Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the Paris attacks cell leader,” Warren said in a video call, using an alternative acronym for the IS group.

Abaaoud was killed in a police raid in Paris five days after the November 13 attacks that left 130 people dead and hundreds more wounded in a series of coordinated attacks across the French capital.

A French source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there was no immediate evidence showing Mouadan was involved in the Paris attacks.