On February 3, U.S. President Joe Biden announced that U.S. military forces successfully undertook a counterterrorism operation in Atme, resulting in the death of Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi.
According to reports from neighbours, a loudspeaker in Arabic called for neighbouring civilians to evacuate the area, followed by U.S. forces and an Arabic interpreter on the ground making the same announcements. A senior White House official told Reuters that al-Qurashi then detonated a bomb which killed himself and 12 more people, including members of his family, during the Joint Special Operations Command operation. The explosion was so powerful that al-Qurashi’s corpse was blown out of one of the windows. Following the explosion, U.S. special operations commandos entered the building and had a shootout with survivors, including a lieutenant of al-Qurashi, who was also killed.
According to initial reports from the Syria Civil Defense (White Helmets), four women and six children were among the dead. Later reports from the Syria Civil Defense claimed 13 people were killed. Biden said that the civilian casualties were caused by the explosion of al-Qurashi’s bomb. A fighter of Tahrir al-Sham was also killed in a brief shootout with U.S. forces after he noticed the raid taking place. There were no reported U.S. casualties, although one U.S. helicopter experienced mechanical problems and landed in a separate area, where it was destroyed by another U.S. aircraft. The survivors of the raid, including the family which was not related to IS, and the four children of the IS top lieutenant, were released by the U.S. forces. The four children were subsequently taken into the custody of Tahrir al-Sham.
