A US service member serving with the US-led coalition fighting ISIS was killed Sunday when an improvised explosive device struck a coalition vehicle, the Pentagon confirmed Monday.
Another US service member was wounded in the attack, Pentagon Spokesman Maj. Adrian Rankine-Galloway told CNN.
The identity of the service member killed is being withheld pending notification of their family.
The coalition, Operation Inherent Resolve, released a statement earlier Monday about the incident but as per coalition rules they did not disclose the nationality of either service member.
While coalition casualties in the fight against ISIS have been relatively rare, Sunday’s attack on a US troops comes less than a month after another coalition service member, a master sergeant from the French army’s 13th Parachute Dragoons Regiment, was killed “during combat operations” in support of the fight against ISIS, according to a spokesman for Operation Inherent Resolve.
News of the most recent US casualties comes as the coalition and its local Iraqi and Syrian allies are making significant progress against ISIS.
Backed by coalition airstrikes and military advisers, the Syrian Democratic Forces, a mix of Arab and Kurdish fighters, have captured over 75% of ISIS’s one-time capital of Raqqa.
Coalition warplanes continue to hammer ISIS positions in the city, carrying out 49 airstrikes on ISIS positions there over the weekend.
Meanwhile in Iraq, the coalition said that over the weekend Iraqi troops had ejected ISIS from 71 villages in the area of Hawija, one of the terror group’s few remaining areas of control in Iraq.