British fighter jets have carried out the first airstrikes in Syria targeting Islamic State – also known as IS or Daesh – following a vote in parliament backing increased military action. Three strikes near Abu Kamal also hit well heads, the Combined Joint Task Force said in the statement.
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The operation followed a tumultuous day at Westminster which saw MPs vote decisively to extend air strikes against IS – which had been confined to Iraq – into Syria.
“There are plenty more of these targets throughout eastern and northern Syria which we hope to be striking in the next few days and weeks”.
But although the British vote adds little additional military capability to the coalition, it has had outsized political and diplomatic significance since last month’s attacks in Paris, as Europe’s other leading military power wrestled with a decision to join France in expanding its military action. “We know who in Turkey are filling their pockets and allowing terrorists to earn money by selling oil stolen from Syria”, he said in his annual state of the nation address.
Prime Minister David Cameron said on Wednesday, prior to the House of Commons vote: “Do we go after these terrorists in their heartlands from where they are plotting to kill British people, or do we sit back and wait for them to attack us?”.
The statement on Abadi’s official Facebook page came after U.S. Army Colonel Steve Warren said a new force of around 100 special operations troops would be deployed to assist in the military campaign against Islamic State militants in Iraq.
MPs voted by 397 to 223 in favour of military action to target IS in the war-torn country.
But for the prime minister, with this, his third big foreign intervention – Libya, Iraq, now Syria – pulling together a wider plan to achieve real peace is a far more complex task, one he acknowledges the United Kingdom can not complete on its own.
A Ministry of Defence spokesman told the AP the planes had constructed strikes in Syria, and details about their targets would be provided later Thursday.
“There will be strong support from our allies because they wanted us to join them in taking this action”, Mr Cameron said.
In addition, 6 Typhoon attack jets, often called Euro-fighters, took off from the air force base in Lossiemouth, Scotland, for Cyprus early Thursday morning.
As Raqqa Is Slowly Dying’s Sarmad Al Jilane wrote in a blog post published Monday, the U.S.-led coalition already conducting airstrikes in Syria has made no progress against ISIS.
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Critics of air strikes – including the 54-strong SNP – were emboldened by criticism of Mr Cameron’s case from the influential Commons Foreign Affairs Committee and controversy over his claims of 70,000 moderate Syrian forces on the ground. “Now we’re going after them”.
