Airwars assessment
According to Voice of America correspondent Harun Maruf, two airstrikes by an unknown party struck al Shabaab targets in southern Somalia. One unsuccesfully targeted a ‘senior ISIS figure’ near Buaale.
According to Maruf’s tweet, “There are reports of 2 new airstrikes in S. Somalia overnight. A strike in Jamame area reportedly hit a graduation ceremony of new recruits for Jaysh Ayman, the Al-Shabaab unit that operates in Kenya; the 2nd strike in Buale area missed to hit a senior Al-Shabaab figure, source.”
No additional public details are presently known about this event.
Asked whether it had been responsible for this event, in February 2020 a senior AFRICOM official told Airwars that this was not the case. However, this may not preclude actions by the CIA which conducts its own undeclared strikes in Somalia.
The incident occured during the night.
Summary
Sources (1) [ collapse]
Media
from sources (1) [ collapse]
Geolocation notes
Reports of the incident mention that the strike took place in the Bu’aale area. The coordinates for the town of Bu’aale are: 1.251778, 42.575959. Due to limited information and satellite imagery available to Airwars, we were unable to verify the location further.