The Russian Ministry of Defense revealed on Saturday that approximately 180 ISIS militants and two field commanders were killed after Russian military intelligence learned of a looming attack on the besieged city of Deir ez-Zor:
The concentration of Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) forces near the besieged Syrian city was noticed by Russian surveillance drones in early June, the ministry said in a statement on Saturday.
Just another day at the office
The military command decided to conduct preemptive airstrikes to prevent their ensuing attack.
Two airstrikes delivered on June 6 and 8 by the Russian Air Force in Syria killed two prominent IS field commanders, Belgian Abu Umar al-Beljiki and Egyptian Abu Yasin al-Masri, the statement said.
Eighteen vehicles, an artillery piece and an ammunition stockpile were also destroyed by the strikes.
On Friday it was revealed that a Russian airstrike near Raqqa killed up to 30 ISIS fields commanders; ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi might have also been killed in the strike.
Anyone is free to republish, copy, and redistribute the text in this content (but not the images or videos) in any medium or format, with the right to remix, transform, and build upon it, even commercially, as long as they provide a backlink and credit to Russia Insider. It is not necessary to notify Russia Insider. Licensed Creative Commons
Our commenting rules: You can say pretty much anything except the F word. If you are abusive, obscene, or a paid troll, we will ban you. Full statement from the Editor, Charles Bausman.