A French-born ISIS recruiter who is believed to have inspired terrorist attacks in his home country was the target of a strike in Mosul, Iraq, the US military said Friday.
The Pentagon said it was still assessing the results of the strike, which occurred within the past three days.
Authorities believe Rachid Kassim inspired the killing of a French priest in the town of Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray in July and a failed gas canister attack on Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris in September.
Kassim, 29, was previously based in Syria where officials have said he stage-managed plots by radicals in France by communicating with them through the encrypted Telegram messaging app. He was also linked to the killing of a French police commander and his partner in Magnanville, France.
French security sources told CNN in November that Kassim had been offline for weeks.
Mosul is the site of pitched battles between Iraqi forces — aided by coalition forces — and ISIS, which seized control of the large city in 2014. The coalition recently wrested the parts of the city east of the Tigris River from ISIS control. Officials have said the fight for control of the west side could drag into March.
