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04/27/2024 11:46:04 pm

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U.S., Arab Partners Rain Bombs on ISIL Mobile Oil Refineries in new Air Strikes; UAE's First Female Fighter Pilot was Team Leader

First Female Pilot

(Photo : The National UAE) Major Mariam Al Mansouri, first female pilot of the UAE Air Force, gives a thumbs up sign to ground crew as she prepares to take off in an undated photo. UAE sources say Maj. Al Mansouri, flying an F-16, was a team leader in several sorties that the UAE flew in support of the U.S.-led air strikes against ISIL targets Monday and Wednesday.

United States and Arab coalition partners rained bombs and missiles once again on ISIL positions in eastern Syria Wednesday, this time targeting mobile oil refineries being used by the terror group to sell oil to finance its operations.

Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral John Kirby said fighter aircraft from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates flew alongside U.S. jets during the operation. This latest wave of airstrikes was aimed at cutting off the flow of money into ISIL hands. Earlier reports said the group was earning about US$2 million a day from the oil produced by mobile refineries.

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Admiral Kirby said Wednesday's air strikes hit 12 locations, and even as the U.S. military assesses the outcome, they were mostly successful.

"We are very confident we hit what we were aiming at, and we caused the damage we wanted," Kirby said.

Wednesday's air strikes began only hours after U.S. President Barack Obama spoke before UN members and called for united action against the ISIL.

"Humanity's future depends on us uniting against those who would divide us along fault lines of tribe or sect; race or religion," Obama said before the U.N. General Assembly. "Collectively, we must take concrete steps to address the danger posed by religiously motivated fanatics, and the trends that fuel their recruitment."

In the first wave of Syria airstrikes earlier in the week, four of five Arab countries supporting the anti-ISIL campaign took part in the combat operations, with the UAE playing the most significant role, according to a Pentagon official.

UAE's first female Air Force pilot, Major Mariam Al Mansouri, 35, served as a team leader during one of Tuesday's air strikes, flying an F-16 Block 60 fighter. Her participation also marked the first time that a female Arab pilot took part in combat operations.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE each flew four F-16 jets and made bombing runs targeting ISIL positions in Raqqa, where the terrorists earlier raided and overran a Syrian airbase, and reportedly massacred up to 200 Syrian government soldiers. Jordan flew four F-15 jets, and Bahrain flew two F-15s.

Qatar was said to have deployed an undetermined number of French-made Mirage 2000 fighters but did not drop bombs or fire missiles.

Pentagon sources say some of the Arab partners also flew surveillance flights before the actual airstrikes. 

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