White House Confirms Trump Has Killed Two More Top Terrorists | Eastern North Carolina Now

Publisher's note: This informational nugget was sent to me by Ben Shapiro, who represents the Daily Wire, and since this is one of the most topical news events, it should be published on BCN.

The author of this post is Ryan Saavedra.

    The Trump administration confirmed that a mission directed by President Donald Trump last month was successful in killing a top Al-Qaeda terrorist in the Middle East.

    "At the direction of President Donald J. Trump, the United States conducted a counterterrorism operation in Yemen that successfully eliminated Qasim al-Rimi, a founder and the leader of al-Qa'ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and a deputy to al-Qa'ida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri. Rimi joined al-Qa'ida in the 1990s, working in Afghanistan for Osama bin Laden," The White House said in a statement. "Under Rimi, AQAP committed unconscionable violence against civilians in Yemen and sought to conduct and inspire numerous attacks against the United States and our forces."

    "His death further degrades AQAP and the global al-Qa'ida movement, and it brings us closer to eliminating the threats these groups pose to our national security," the statement continued. "The United States, our interests, and our allies are safer as a result of his death. We will continue to protect the American people by tracking down and eliminating terrorists who seek to do us harm."

    News that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had targeted al-Rimi in a strike initially broke last week, although the U.S. government did not put out a statement at the time confirming the news.

    The New York Times reported on Sunday that al-Rimi had claimed credit for the December 6 Islamic terrorist attack on Naval Air Station Pensacola where three U.S. sailors were killed and eight other Americans sustained severe injuries.

    The Daily Wire highlighted last week several other top Islamic terrorists that Trump has killed since October:

• The news comes after a Trump-authorized drone strike killed Iranian terrorist leader Qassem Soleimani, Commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force (IRGC-QF), in early January.
• In October, Trump authorized a raid targeting ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in Syria which resulted in al-Baghdadi's death when he detonated a suicide vest as he was running from U.S. forces.
• The day after al-Baghdadi was killed, U.S. forces conducted another attack that resulted in the death of al-Baghdadi's likely successor, Abu Hassan al-Muhajir, when an airstrike took him out as he was being "smuggled across northern Syria in the back of an oil tanker truck," the Times reported.
• Another terrorist that the Trump administration took care of was Osama bin Laden's son, Hamza bin Laden, who had repeatedly threatened to attack the U.S. and who was believed to be in line to taking over Al Qaeda.

    The Trump administration also reportedly targeted Abdul Reza Shahlai, an official with Iran's Quds Force, in a drone strike on the same day that it took out Soleimani.

    "The disclosure of a second mission indicated that the Trump administration was attempting to target a larger set of Iranian military and paramilitary leaders than was previously known," The New York Times reported. "The unsuccessful airstrike in Yemen was aimed at Abdul Reza Shahlai, an official with Iran's Quds Force, a potent paramilitary organization. He was known as a key financier for Iran's proxy wars."