Terrorist Organization
Appears in 6 stories
Regrouping in Syria's desert badlands after losing territorial control in 2019
A lone ISIS gunman killed two Iowa National Guardsmen and a civilian interpreter in Palmyra, Syria, on December 13, 2025—the first American combat deaths since Bashar al-Assad fled the country a year earlier. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth responded with Operation Hawkeye Strike.
Updated 1 hour ago
Conducting insurgency operations in Syria and Iraq
On December 13, 2025, a Syrian security officer allegedly affiliated with ISIS opened fire on US troops near Palmyra, killing two Iowa National Guard members (Staff Sgts. Edgar Brian Torres-Tovar and William Nathaniel Howard) and interpreter Ayad Mansoor Sakat. The US responded six days later with Operation Hawkeye Strike: 100 precision munitions against 70 ISIS targets in central Syria via fighter jets, attack helicopters, and artillery, plus Jordanian F-16s, which Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called 'a declaration of vengeance.'
Updated 14 hours ago
ISIS has not claimed the Palmyra insider shooting, but reporting said it claimed subsequent attacks on Syrian security forces after the U.S. retaliation.
In the first post-strike readout of
Updated Yesterday
Degraded but still the world's deadliest terrorist organization by attack count
At the peak in 2014, terrorism killed roughly 33,000 people worldwide — driven largely by the Islamic State's rapid territorial conquest across Iraq and Syria. Twelve years later, the Global Terrorism Index for 2026 reports that annual deaths have dropped 83%, to 5,582 — the lowest figure since 2007. Terrorist incidents fell 22% to 2,944, and 81 countries recorded improvements.
Updated Mar 28
Degraded insurgency; no territorial control; conducting low-level guerrilla operations
Iraq declared victory over the Islamic State in December 2017 after recapturing Mosul and eliminating the group's territorial caliphate. Eight years later, Iraqi F-16s are still hunting militants in desert hideouts—a reminder that defeating an insurgency's territory is not the same as defeating its fighters.
Updated Feb 12
Active cells operating in Turkey despite territorial defeat in 2019
A six-hour gun battle at 2am in a Turkish village left three police officers and six ISIS militants dead on December 30. Officers İlker Pehlivan, Turgut Külünk, and Yasin Koçyiğit died storming a house in Elmalik where militants used women and children as human shields, refusing police pleas to surrender. Eight more officers and a night watchman were wounded before the standoff ended at 9:40am with all five women and six children evacuated safely.
Updated Dec 30, 2025
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