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U.S. Says ISIS Leaders Linked to Paris Attacks Killed in Syria Strike

The bombing was carried out in the de-facto ISIS capital of Raqqa on Dec. 4.
Image: Fighters from the al-Qaida linked Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) march in Raqqa, Syria.
ISIS fighters march in Raqqa, Syria, in an image posted on a militant website in 2014.militant website via AP file

An airstrike by the U.S.-led coalition killed three ISIS leaders in Syria, including two militants responsible for facilitating the city-wide attacks in Paris last November, the Pentagon said Tuesday.

The bombing was carried out in the de-facto ISIS capital of Raqqa on Dec. 4, according to a statement by Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook, but the details were not released until now.

The three ISIS leaders killed were Salah Gourmat, Sammy Djedou and Walid Hamman, Cook said. Gourmat and Djedou "were involved in facilitating" the attack in Paris on Nov. 13, 2015, in which 130 people were killed in bombings and shootings across the French capital.

Related: What You Need to Know About The U.S.-Backed Assault on Syria's Raqqa

The third target, Hamman, was a "suicide attack planner" who was convicted in his absence in Belgium for a disrupted terror plot last year, the spokesman added.

Cook said all three were part of a network led by Boubaker Al-Hakim, a militant linked to the Charlie Hebdo magazine attack on Jan. 7, 2015. Al-Hakim was killed in another coalition airstrike on Nov. 16.

"The three were working together to plot and facilitate attacks against Western targets at the time of the strike," Cook said. "Those who seek to attack the United States, our coalition partners and allies around the world will find no safe haven."

The U.S. is backing Kurdish and Arab fighters in an attempt to seize back control of Raqqa, which was captured by ISIS in 2014.