US airstrike targets Islamic State leader once thought dead

WASHINGTON – The Pentagon says that a top Islamic State commander believed to have been killed earlier this year was likely at an IS meeting Sunday near Mosul, Iraq, that was hit by an airstrike.

Pentagon press secretary Peter Cook says the U.S. is still working to confirm whether Omar al-Shishani was killed in the latest strike.

He says the U.S. had gotten indications very recently that al-Shishani may not be dead, and that he would be at the Sunday meeting. The U.S. ordered the strike to target him again.

The Pentagon in March confirmed that Shishani, also known as Omar the Chechen, had died from wounds suffered in an airstrike in Syria.

Al-Shishani has held numerous senior military positions within the Islamic State group, including “minister of war.”