Manama: US Central Command chief General Kenneth McKenzie said on Saturday about 500 US personnel in east Syria are expected to resume operations against Daesh in coming days and weeks.
Daesh has lost nearly all its territory in Syria and US forces killed its former leader Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi last month, but the group that once controlled a third of Syria and neighbouring Iraq is still seen as a threat.
The administration of President Donald Trump shocked US allies last December by saying Washington was pulling out all its troops from Syria.
It said later it decided to keep a residual force in the northeastern part of the country, focusing on preventing Daesh from staging a comeback and attacking the oil fields there.
“Now I’ve got about 500 US personnel generally east of the Euphrates river, east of Deir Al Zor up to Hasaka, northeast all the way up into extreme northeast Syria,” McKenzie told reporters on the sidelines of the Manama Dialogue security summit in Bahrain.
“It is our intention to remain in that position working with our SDF (Syrian Democratic Forces) partners to continue operations against Daesh down the Euphrates river valley where those targets present themselves,” he added.
Turkey launched and then halted an offensive against the YPG, the main component of the US-backed SDF that helped the United States defeat Daesh, which it sees as a terrorist group with links to Kurdish militants on Turkish soil.