U.S.-backed forces have deprived the Islamic State of its final foothold in Syria, the White House said Friday, declaring an apparent end to the campaign to wrest territory from the militant group.
"The territorial caliphate has been eliminated in Syria," White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters aboard Air Force One.
President Donald Trump, making brief remarks to reporters after landing in Palm Beach, Fla., showed reporters a map of Iraq and Syria. "There's [the Islamic State], and that's what we have right now," he said, indicating areas no longer controlled by militants.
The announcement, more than four years after the United States launched its first airstrikes against the then-formidable militant group, follows months of speculation about when U.S.-backed Syrian forces would push the group out of its final foothold in eastern Syria. Neighboring Iraq declared victory over the group in late 2017.
While Trump, who has been eager to end the U.S. military mission in Syria, has repeatedly suggested that final ground victory was imminent, the operation has dragged on as local forces have struggled to root out militants dug in among civilians.
A conclusion to the operation would be a milestone for the Pentagon, which has a force of more than 2,000 troops on the ground in Syria operating in support of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, the chief U.S. partner against the Islamic State militants.
Despite Trump's surprise declaration in December that all U.S. forces would be coming home from the conflict, the Pentagon now plans to keep at least 400 troops in Syria to help the Syrian Democratic Forces and other allies maintain security in former Islamic State strongholds.
Sanders told reporters that the Pentagon, which has been more cautious than the White House in its assessment of progress against the Islamic State, had "made the call" that the Islamic State had been defeated.
After the White House announcement Friday, a spokesman for the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces tweeted that "heavy fighting continues" around Baghouz in eastern Syria. The spokesman, Mustafa Bali, also said international forces had conducted "several airstrikes" against the extremists Thursday night.
Another senior U.S. official said Friday that the Syrian Democratic Forces planned to issue a statement when they believe the final remnants of the caliphate have been liberated.
Other American officials familiar with the situation in Syria said that the Syrian Democratic Forces were still battling remaining Islamic State fighters who were holed up in tunnels along river cliffs in Baghouz. Another official confirmed that the U.S. launched airstrikes there on Friday and that the fighting continued to clear out final pockets of Islamic State members.
Associated Press journalists in Baghouz said coalition fighters were still conducting mop-up operations in the village after seizing an encampment Tuesday where the extremists had been for months. Syrian Democratic Forces spokesman Kino Gabriel said earlier Friday that there were still Islamic State fighters and women and children hiding in caves near Baghouz. He said final operations were ongoing and there appeared to be several hundred people still inside. Other Syrian Democratic Forces officials said the camp was full of corpses, and some civilians and Islamic State fighters were still handing themselves over.
As the militants have put up a desperate, last-ditch fight for weeks, they have kept up their recruiting efforts, as Trump noted.
"ISIS uses the internet better than almost anyone, but for all those susceptible to ISIS propaganda, they are now being beaten badly at every level," the president tweeted, using an acronym for the Islamic State. "They will always try to show a glimmer of vicious hope, but they are losers and barely breathing."
He warned would-be recruits: "Think about that before you destroy your lives and the lives of your family!"
The coalition siege has been slowed by the unexpectedly large number of civilians in Baghouz, most of them families of Islamic State members. In recent weeks, they have been flowing out, exhausted, hungry and often wounded. The sheer number who emerged -- nearly 30,000 since early January, according to Kurdish officials -- took the Syrian Democratic Forces by surprise.
According to the officials, the Syrian Democratic Forces is moving slowly and carefully, and is willing to wait out the Islamic State fighters who are out of food and low on water. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss mission details.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, speaking Thursday in Jerusalem, said that the U.S.-led coalition had achieved "amazing" results in Syria.
But he said, "The threat from radical Islamic terrorism remains."
Information for this article was contributed by Missy Ryan and John Wagner of The Washington Post; by Thomas Gibbons-Neff of The New York Times; and by Deb Riechmann, Lolita C. Baldor, Philip Issa, Robert Burns, Zeke Miller, Kevin Freking and Matthew Lee of The Associated Press.
A Section on 03/23/2019