Striking Back: French Jets Bomb ISIS Targets in Syrian Stronghold of Raqqa

French jets struck the heart of ISIS-controlled territory on Sunday in the first direct retaliation for Friday’s terror attacks that killed at least 129 people in Paris.

Twelve aircraft, including 10 French fighter jets, dropped 20 bombs on a command and control center, a jihadi recruitment center, munitions depot and ISIS training camp in the Syrian city of Raqqa, France’s Defense Ministry said in a statement. Raqqa is the de facto capital of the Islamic State’s “caliphate” . . .

The U.S. has conducted the vast majority of coalition attacks on ISIS territory up to this point, and has been almost solely responsible for all coalition bombings of ISIS inside Syria. However, the nature of Friday’s attacks, which devastated France and shocked the world, changed the calculus.

The airstrikes came as The New York Times reported that investigators believe that at least one of Friday’s eight attackers had visited Syria, while some of the other assailants had been communicating with known ISIS members before the attacks.

European intelligence officials told the paper that they believed that Ismael Omar Mostefai, a 29-year-old French citizen, traveled to Syria via Turkey in 2012. Mostefai was identified as one of the terrorists who blew himself up at the Bataclan concert hall, but not before helping to murder 89 concert-goers. (Read more from “Striking Back: French Jets Bomb ISIS Targets in Syrian Stronghold of Raqqa” HERE)

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