The United States carried out an airstrike in Syria that reportedly killed at least 25 members of former Al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, including senior figures, a U.S. military official said Wednesday.
"This was a U.S. strike," said Colonel John Dorrian, a U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad. He gave no toll.
The attack was carried out Tuesday on one of the group's most important bases in Syria, in the northwestern province of Idlib, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights told AFP.
Among the dead were leading members of the formerly known as the Nusra Front holding a meeting, the observatory said without identifying them.
The front had accused the U.S.-led coalition of being behind the attack and said it killed more than 20 people. Dorrian said it was carried out only by U.S. warplanes.
CENTCOM, which oversees U.S. military operations in the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia, also confirmed that U.S. forces staged an air raid Sunday in the same region, near the city of Sarmada.
It did not specify the target but the observatory said it was two cars carrying three leaders of Jabhat Fatah al-Sham and that all three were killed.
Idlib province is largely controlled by that group and others allied with it.
Tuesday's airstrike came four days into a cease-fire between Syria's government and major rebel groups. The truce was brokered by Russia and Turkey.
Moscow and Damascus say it does not cover Jabhat Fatah al-Sham or ISIS, labeled by the U.N. Security Council as terrorist organizations.
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