Navy SEALs kill seven militants in Yemen raid

Members of the Navy’s elite SEAL Team 6 killed seven militants but suffered combat wounds themselves during an early Tuesday raid on a compound associated with al-Qaida in Yemen, the Pentagon said.

Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, declined to say how many members of the SEAL unit were wounded or to describe the extent of their injuries, citing rules for secrecy and operational security.

But he said the injured Americans were not in such serious condition that they required medical evacuation.

It was the first ground raid in Yemen that the military has acknowledged since Navy SEALs carried out a similar attack in late January, the first such operation authorized by President Donald Trump. One Navy SEAL team member died and three others were injured in that mission, and as many as 25 civilians were killed.

Tuesday’s raid took the U.S. service members deeper into Yemeni territory than they had ever been before, Davis said.

The Americans, working in cooperation with the Yemeni government, attacked an al-Qaida encampment in Marib province and then called in support from an AC-130 gunship after a firefight broke out.

In a statement after the operation, the U.S. Central Command said the raid targeted a compound that was linked to the al-Qaida affiliate in Yemen, known as al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula.

U.S. forces killed seven al-Qaida militants through small-arms fire and precision airstrikes, the statement said, referring to strikes by drones, helicopters or attack planes.

Col. John Thomas, a Central Command spokesman, said afterward that the raid was intended to seize potentially important information from the compound — typically electronic devices such as computers, hard drives and cellphones — and was not an attempt to kill or capture a particular individual.

It was unclear why the Defense Department chose to disclose the details of the raid since U.S. commandos have carried out several clandestine raids since the illfated one on Jan. 29.