The Islamic State group claimed responsibility on Saturday, February 22, for killing three members of the Syrian Ministry of Defense in northeastern Syria, two days after it said it carried out another attack in Deir Ezzor province.
In a statement published through its affiliated Dabiq news agency, the group said it shot and killed a Syrian army member in the city of al-Mayadin in Deir Ezzor province using a pistol. It also attacked two others with machine guns in the village of al-Wasata in the northern countryside of Raqqa province, killing them.
The claim follows a statement issued on Thursday, in which the group said it had killed one member of Syrian government forces and wounded another in the countryside of Deir Ezzor, signaling continued activity by its sleeper cells in the region despite its territorial losses in recent years.
For its part, the Syrian Ministry of Defense’s Media and Communication Department said that “a member of the Ministry of Defense was targeted by unknown assailants in the village of al-Wasata in the northern Raqqa countryside, resulting in his immediate death along with a civilian,” without explicitly identifying the perpetrating party.
Renewed activity in northeastern Syria
Areas of northeastern Syria, particularly the countryside of Deir Ezzor, Raqqa, and al-Hasakah provinces, have witnessed intermittent attacks in recent years. During the period when the Syrian Democratic Forces, SDF, controlled the region, its fighters, as well as local notables and civilians, were frequently targeted in operations often attributed to Islamic State cells.
The group returned to the spotlight on Friday through an audio recording attributed to its official spokesperson, “Abu Hudhayfah al-Ansari,” which included a direct attack on the Syrian government.
According to monitoring by Enab Baladi, the recording described the Syrian government as “secular” and called for confronting it, while alluding to official figures and suggesting that the fate of some would be similar to that of the former regime’s president.
The recording also framed Syria’s current landscape as a transition from Iranian influence to Turkish and American influence, in an attempt to reshape the political narrative in line with the group’s ideological discourse and maintain symbolic presence despite battlefield losses.
These developments come amid local and international reports of renewed Islamic State cell activity in the Syrian desert and areas east of the Euphrates River, where overlapping security actors, vast geography, and limited control create opportunities for mobility.
136 attacks in 2025
In January alone, the Islamic State claimed four operations, three against the SDF and one against the Syrian government.
In statistics published by its Amaq news agency, the group said it carried out 136 attacks in Syria in 2025, resulting in 228 casualties, including those killed and wounded. These operations were part of 1,218 attacks recorded in 13 countries across Asia and Europe during the same year.
Over recent months, the eastern and western countryside of Deir Ezzor has witnessed sporadic assassinations targeting government forces and SDF members, in addition to attacks on checkpoints and military positions, often claimed through the group’s media outlets.
Al-Mayadin and its surrounding countryside remain among the most active areas for Islamic State cells, due to their proximity to the Syrian desert, where repeated attacks against government forces continue to be recorded.
In Raqqa, the past two years have seen repeated incidents involving improvised explosive devices and direct gunfire targeting military and security personnel, amid periodic security campaigns conducted by the SDF to pursue active cells.
The Islamic State lost its territorial control in Syria in 2019 after battles that ended in the town of al-Baghouz in the eastern countryside of Deir Ezzor. However, it has maintained a presence through mobile sleeper cells carrying out hit-and-run operations.
The group periodically releases statements affirming its continued activity in various parts of Syria, particularly in the desert and east of the Euphrates.
Meanwhile, the US-led international coalition regularly announces security operations targeting Islamic State members and dismantling their networks. The US Central Command said it carried out more than 10 airstrikes targeting over 30 Islamic State sites between February 3 and 12, 2026.
The strikes in Syria killed communication hubs, logistical nodes, and weapons caches in an effort to weaken the group’s capabilities and deplete its hideouts, in what sources described as continued US military pressure following the group’s loss of major territory. Thousands of detainees were also transferred to Iraqi detention facilities to prevent their exploitation in future operations.
The latest developments coincide with an escalation in the group’s media rhetoric alongside its claims of sporadic attacks, reflecting an effort to project both operational and symbolic presence amid ongoing political and military shifts in northeastern Syria.
Islamic State claims two attacks after rallying supporters in Syria Enab Baladi.
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