SANAA, Yemen (AP) — The U.S. military said Sunday that one service member was killed and three others wounded in a raid in Yemen targeting its local al-Qaida branch, marking the first-known combat death of a member of the U.S. military under President Donald Trump's new administration.
U.S. Central Command said in a statement that a fourth service member was injured in a "hard landing" in a nearby location. The aircraft was unable to fly afterward and was "intentionally destroyed."
The Central Command statement said 14 militants from al-Qaida's branch in Yemen, formally known as "al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula," were killed in the assault and that U.S. service members taking part in the raid captured "information that will likely provide insight into the planning of future terror plots."
Yemeni security and tribal officials said the surprise dawn assault in Yemen's central Bayda province killed three senior al-Qaida leaders: Abdul-Raouf al-Dhahab, Sultan al-Dhahab, and Seif al-Nims.
The al-Dhahab family is considered an ally of al-Qaida, which is now chiefly concentrated in Bayda province. A third family member, Tarek al-Dhahab, was killed in a U.S. drone strike several years ago. It was not immediately clear whether the family members were actual members of al-Qaida.
The U.S. troops killed or wounded some two dozen men, including some Saudis present at the site, according to the Yemeni officials. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief journalists.
An official with al-Qaida confirmed the killings, describing the attack as a "massacre" and saying that women and children had been killed as well. The official sent to The Associated Press in Cairo photos purportedly showing the bloodied bodies of several children killed in the raid.