DAMASCUS (Dispatches) – A man killed in a U.S. drone strike in northwestern Syria earlier this month may not have been a senior Al-Qaeda leader, as previously claimed by the Pentagon, the Washington Post has reported.
U.S. officials, cited by the Post, expressed uncertainty about the target of the attack. The Pentagon has declined to disclose the name of the individual. However, relatives and neighbors of the victim assert that he had no affiliation with the militants.
Unnamed officials cited in the Post article cast doubts on the accuracy of the strike, which took place in a rural area of Idlib Province on May 3.
“We are no longer confident we killed a senior AQ official,” one official stated, referring to Al-Qaeda. The second official added, “Though we believe the strike did not kill the original target, we believe the person to be Al-Qaeda.”
According to the Post, residents of the Syrian village targeted in the U.S. strike identified the victim as Lotfi Hassan Misto, a 56-year-old farmer and father of 10. They informed the newspaper that Misto was tending to his flock of sheep when he was killed by a Hellfire missile. Family members and neighbors adamantly deny any connection between Misto and any militant group. Misto’s brother told the Post, “If they claim that he’s a terrorist, or that they got someone from Al-Qaeda, they’re all liars.”
In response to the report, U.S. Central Command spokesman Michael Lawhorn stated that the military takes such allegations seriously and is investigating whether the action unintentionally harmed civilians. When provided with coordinates indicating the strike’s location near Misto’s home and chicken farm, an unnamed defense official referred to it as a “known area of interest” to Al-Qaeda. However, local residents disputed this assertion, asserting that terrorists do not reside or operate in close proximity to Misto’s residence.
The Pentagon previously acknowledged that a similar drone strike in Kabul in 2021 was a “tragic mistake.” Initially, the U.S. claimed to have killed a high-level Daesh militant, but later admitted that the raid resulted in the deaths of 10 civilians.