Nov 6, 2014 3 min read

BAGHDAD – American fighter jets carried out a series of airstrikes in northwestern Syria Thursday that sought to kill leaders of an al-Qaida-linked militant cell that is plotting attacks on the West, U.S. officials said.

U.S. intelligence assessments call the group Khorasan and said it could pose a more immediate threat to the United States and Europe than the Islamic State, which has seized territory on both sides of the Iraq-Syria border.

While a U.S.-led coalition has frequently bombed the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, it had not targeted Khorasan since hitting its bases with a barrage of cruise missiles at the start of its campaign in Syria Sept. 23.

Of greatest interest to the U.S. government is Muhsin al-Fadhli, a Kuwaiti who is said to have founded Khorasan in Syria and was a senior al-Qaida operative close to Osama bin Laden.

After the strikes in September, U.S. officials expressed optimism that the missile barrage had killed at least some of Khorasan’s leaders, including Fadhli. Some jihadist sympathizers hailed him on social media as a “martyr.”

But in recent weeks, as intelligence analysts sifted through field reports and communications intercepts, they grew more certain that senior members of the group had survived.

“The Khorasan group, we still believe, remains a dangerous entity, that they still have desires and designs to attack Western targets,” Rear Adm. John Kirby, the Pentagon press secretary, told reporters this week.

Kirby declined to comment on the status of Khorasan’s leadership.

In a statement after Thursday’s strike, the U.S. Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East, said that initial reports indicated that the strikes had succeeded in “destroying or severely damaging several Khorasan group vehicles and buildings assessed to be meeting and staging areas, I.E.D.-making facilities and training facilities.”

The statement did not mention the targeting of any individuals.

Many in the Syrian opposition have expressed skepticism about the existence of the Khorasan group, saying that the United States had created it to justify strikes on Islamist rebels. Some also defend the Nusra Front, calling it a loyal ally in the fight against President Bashar Assad.

All the strikes on Tuesday occurred in the ungoverned strip of land along the Turkish border, where many rebel groups have bases and frequently go to Turkey to buy supplies and to take a break from the war. Membership in many of these groups is fluid, with fighters flowing among them based on who has arms and money.