{"id":1615868,"date":"2022-08-19T08:03:12","date_gmt":"2022-08-19T12:03:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1615868"},"modified":"2022-08-19T08:03:17","modified_gmt":"2022-08-19T12:03:17","slug":"13-militants-killed-in-somalia-by-u-s-air-strike-says-dod","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/13-militants-killed-in-somalia-by-u-s-air-strike-says-dod\/","title":{"rendered":"13 Militants Killed in Somalia by U.S. Air Strike, Says DoD"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">22<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2F13-militants-killed-in-somalia-by-u-s-air-strike-says-dod%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1615868&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><\/div>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 kEzXdV body-paragraph body-paragraph\">A U.S. airstrike killed an estimated 13 al-Shabab militants in Somalia on Sunday, according to a U.S. Africa Command news release Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 kEzXdV body-paragraph body-paragraph\">The airstrike is the seventh such attack against the Islamic militant group confirmed by AFRICOM in 2022. All but one of this year\u2019s strikes have been launched since May, when President Joe Biden <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/05\/16\/us\/politics\/biden-military-somalia.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">authorized the military<\/a> to deploy hundreds of special operations forces to Somalia.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 kEzXdV body-paragraph body-paragraph\">Biden\u2019s order reversed former former President Donald Trump\u2019s late-presidency <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/usa-trump-somalia\/trump-to-withdraw-most-troops-from-somalia-as-part-of-global-pullback-idUSKBN28F04C\">withdrawal<\/a> of the counterinsurgency forces that had been stationed in the country for more than a decade.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 kEzXdV body-paragraph body-paragraph\">The United States launched Sunday\u2019s airstrike in coordination with the Federal Government of Somalia, the fragile central government that is at war with al-Shabab.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 kEzXdV body-paragraph body-paragraph\">The targets were militants who were \u201cactively attacking\u201d Somali National Army forces near the remote village of Teedaan, nearly 200 miles north of Mogadishu, according to the news release.<\/p>\n<figure><figcaption class=\"image__Caption-sc-23pfqr-0 bJsBbG a-caption\">\n<p class=\"ImageMetadata__MetadataParagraph-sc-1gn0vty-0 eGGFoB image-metadata\"><span>U.S. troops assigned to the East Africa Response Force train at the U.S. Embassy in Mogadishu, Somalia, April 20, 2022. (Staff Sgt. Alysia Blake\/Air Force) <\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 kEzXdV body-paragraph body-paragraph\">Sunday\u2019s attack brings the number of al-Shabab fighters killed in U.S. airstrikes this year to an estimated 27, according to AFRICOM news releases. It comes days after <a href=\"https:\/\/www.militarytimes.com\/news\/pentagon-congress\/2022\/08\/10\/us-launches-three-airstrikes-against-al-shabab-in-somalia\/\">an airstrike<\/a> on Aug. 9 left a presumed four al-Shabab fighters dead.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 kEzXdV body-paragraph body-paragraph\">AFRICOM <a href=\"https:\/\/www.africom.mil\/airstrikes\/civilian-casualty-report\">has reported<\/a> no civilian deaths resulting from airstrikes against al-Shabab this year, including in Sunday\u2019s attack. But in 2020, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hrw.org\/news\/2020\/06\/16\/somalia-inadequate-us-airstrike-investigations\">human rights groups<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amnesty.org\/en\/latest\/news\/2020\/04\/somalia-zero-accountability-as-civilian-deaths-mount-from-us-air-strikes\/\">accused<\/a> AFRICOM of not reporting civilian deaths from its airstrikes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 kEzXdV body-paragraph body-paragraph\">Though there has been a noticeable increase in the number of strikes in Somalia since U.S. troops returned under Biden, the Trump years also saw a fair amount of combat there before the withdrawal order in December 2020.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 kEzXdV body-paragraph body-paragraph\">One U.S. soldier was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.militarytimes.com\/flashpoints\/2018\/06\/08\/one-killed-several-wounded-in-attack-on-us-forces-in-somalia\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">killed in Somalia in 2018<\/a>, another was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.militarytimes.com\/news\/your-military\/2020\/01\/05\/us-aircraft-destroyed-no-troops-injured-in-jihadi-attack-on-base-in-kenya\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">killed in early 2020<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.armytimes.com\/news\/your-army\/2020\/03\/24\/army-advisers-still-in-africa-following-spike-in-combat\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">dozens more were quietly given awards<\/a> showing they saw combat at an obscure Somali airfield in 2019.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 kEzXdV body-paragraph body-paragraph\">The main goal of Al-Shabab, which pledged its allegiance to al-Qaida in 2012, is to overthrow the Somali government and install a fundamentalist Islamic regime in its place. The militant group controls large swaths of the Somali countryside.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 kEzXdV body-paragraph body-paragraph\">Although al-Shabab\u2019s violence has been concentrated in Somalia and neighboring countries, some members have designs on attacking Americans in East Africa or even in the United States, The New York Times <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2020\/03\/21\/world\/africa\/al-qaeda-somalia-shabab.html\">reported<\/a> in 2020.<\/p>\n<div class=\"default__Wrapper-cy7r53-1 iWrUWb\">\n<p class=\"default__BioWrapper-cy7r53-0 duEMsg a-body2\">Irene Loewenson is an editorial fellow at Military Times and Defense News. A native New Yorker, she is a recent graduate of Williams College, where she was the editor-in-chief of the student newspaper.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A U.S. airstrike killed an estimated 13 al-Shabab militants in Somalia on Sunday, according to a U.S. Africa Command news release Wednesday.The airstrike is the seventh such attack against the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1616187,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1615868","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1615868","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1615868"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1615868\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1616187"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1615868"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1615868"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1615868"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}