French fighter jets struck key targets of the Islamic State group (IS) late Sunday night, in a fierce bombing raid on the Syrian city of Raqqa, making good on President François Hollande’s promise for a gloves-off retaliation against the terror group, in response to the devastating terror attacks in Paris, which the French leader had called “an act of war”, reports Time.
Around 10 p.m. Sunday night—exactly two days after the attacks in Paris—French television announced that the country’s military had dropped 20 bombs on Raqqa, the headquarters of IS’s so-called caliphate. Defence officials said the military strikes aimed to destroy an ISIS munitions depot and a training camp for jihadist fighters. The strikes come as French police conducted a massive manhunt for an eighth attacker who escaped after Friday night’s killings.
In a weekend that has been filled with anguished emotion and raw pain, the French bombers struck Syria while a solemn memorial ceremony was underway in Paris’s soaring medieval Notre Dâme cathedral, and while hundreds of people were gathered for spontaneous candlelight vigils at the sites of the attacks in the eastern 10th and 11th districts.
The operation came just hours after US officials—including the top American diplomat in France, US Ambassador Jane Hartley—made it clear that Washington had been in close contact with French officials since the moment after Friday night’s attacks, which killed 132 people and injured about 350 others.
Within an hour of the attacks, the country stunned and shocked, President François Hollande imposed a national state of emergency, and promised he would deal with IS in a “ruthless” manner, calling the terrorism “an act of war.”
All weekend French officials have carefully been preparing the country for likely military retaliation—a move that draws France far more deeply into the military fight against ISIS than it has been until now. They have made it clear that Friday’s attacks were a militaristic operation, conducted by a sophisticated network with international planning.
In an interview published Sunday, defence minister Yves Le Drian told the Journal du Dimanche paper that France “has been struck by an act of war,” and that the country had to take out “all the capabilities” of IS. “Daesh [the Arabic name for IS] is a real terrorist army and we must fight it everywhere and tirelessly,” he said.