According to the US military, attacks by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria are expected to double compared to last year

BAGHDAD (AP) — The U.S. Central Command said Wednesday that the Islamic State is trying to “regroup” as the number of attacks in Syria and Iraq is expected to double this year compared to last year.

ISIS claimed responsibility for 153 attacks in the two countries in the first six months of 2024, CENTCOM said in a statement. The group was behind 121 attacks in Syria and Iraq in 2023, according to a U.S. defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment publicly on the matter.

“The increase in attacks suggests that ISIS is attempting to regroup after several years of reduced effectiveness,” CENTCOM said.

In northeastern Syria, Kurdish-led authorities issued a general amnesty on Wednesday that includes hundreds of Syrians held by the main US-backed force because of their roles within IS.

The US-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) hold over 10,000 captured IS fighters in around two dozen detention centers – including 2,000 foreigners whose home countries refuse to repatriate them. The SDF captured the last strip of Syrian land from IS in March 2019.

The Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria announced that a life sentence would be reduced to 15 years in prison. Prisoners serving life sentences who suffer from incurable diseases and those who have reached the age of 75 would be released. The amnesty will not include IS officials and members who fought against the SDF, nor those who carried out explosive attacks that resulted in deaths.

Legal expert Khaled Jabr told the Associated Press that the amnesty would extend to about 600 Syrian citizens held on terrorism charges and links to IS, as long as they do not have blood on their hands or were arrested in fighting against SDF members.

The announcement comes just after the 10-year mark since the militant group declared its caliphate across large parts of Iraq and Syria. At its peak, the group controlled an area half the size of the United Kingdom and sought to impose its extreme version of Islam, which included attacks on religious minorities and harsh punishments for Muslims deemed apostates.

In addition, militants killed thousands of members of the Yazidi religious minority and abducted thousands of women and children, many of whom became victims of sexual abuse and human trafficking.

A coalition of more than 80 countries led by the United States was formed to fight ISIS, which lost control of the territories it controlled in Iraq in 2017 and in Syria in 2019. Sleeper cells stay in both countries and abroad.

Iraqi officials believe they can contain the IS threat with their own forces and have begun talks with the United States aimed at ending the U.S.-led coalition’s mission in Iraq.

The talks come at a time of increasing domestic tensions over the US military presence.

From October to February, a coalition of Iranian-backed militias calling themselves the Islamic Resistance in Iraq carried out regular drone attacks on US military bases in Iraq and Syria. The attacks were said to be retaliation for Washington’s support of Israel in the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip and were intended to force US troops to withdraw from Iraq.

These attacks largely came to a halt after an attack on a base in Jordan near the Syrian border killed three US soldiers in late January, prompting the US to retaliate in Iraq.

On Tuesday, two Iraqi militia members said they had launched a new drone attack on Iraq’s Ain al-Asad air base. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly. It was unclear whether the attack had hit its target. U.S. officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

____

Associated Press writer Hogir Al Abdo contributed to this report from Kobani, Syria.