Orlando Sentinel

Militant mocks Trump after fatal Yemen raid

- By Thomas Gibbons-Neff

Just days after a covert U.S.-led raid against alQaida’s branch in Yemen that left one Navy SEAL dead, the terrorist group’s leader, Qassim al-Rimi, released an audio recording deriding the outcome of the operation, calling it a “slap” across President Donald Trump’s face.

The 11-minute recording was posted online Saturday and translated by the SITE Intelligen­ce Group.

Al-Rimi claimed that the Jan. 28 joint U.S. and Emerati raid on the village of Yaklaa left “dozens” of Americans killed and wounded and that “they found no other alternativ­e but to destroy their own planes so that it would not be proof of their scandal.”

The Pentagon acknowledg­ed the death of Navy SEAL Chief Petty Officer William “Ryan” Owens, 36, of Illinois. Five other service members were wounded from hostile fire and a hard landing by a Marine MV-22 Osprey that had been sent in to help recover casualties. The Osprey was unable to take off and was subsequent­ly destroyed by an airstrike so that it would not fall into al-Qaida’s hands.

Al-Rimi also said 14 men and 11 women and children were killed in the raid. The Pentagon has said 14 militants were killed in the operation and that it is assessing the number of civilian casualties. Yemeni officials have said the operation killed 15 women and children, including the 8year-old daughter of the radical Yemeni American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who was killed in 2011 in a U.S. drone strike.

Al-Rimi has been the de facto leader of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula since his predecesso­r, Nasir al-Wuhayshi, was killed in a 2015 CIA drone strike.

On Monday, an NBC report said that al-Rimi was the target of the raid.

Col. John Thomas, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command, said that alRimi “was not part of the equation for this raid” and that the operation was solely for “sensitive site exploitati­on.”

The operation was originally proposed under the Obama administra­tion, but because of the mission’s timing, the raid had to be approved by Trump following his inaugurati­on. The White House called the mission a “success,” saying that it had garnered intelligen­ce despite the loss of life.

While the United States maintains a small counterter­rorism presence in Yemen, the Pentagon is drawing up plans to expand its campaign against alQaida militants there, according to U.S. officials familiar with the proposal.

 ?? EPA 2016 ?? Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said President Donald Trump had shown the “real face” of the U.S.
EPA 2016 Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said President Donald Trump had shown the “real face” of the U.S.

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