Suspected Islamic State motorcycle squad kills 53 people who were searching for prized truffles in Syria
- At least 53 people searching for truffles were killed in Syria by Islamic State, state media reported.
- Islamic State has not immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.
At least 53 people searching for desert truffles were killed on Friday in Syria after an attack by the Islamic State, state media reported.
"Fifty-three citizens who were collecting truffles were killed in an attack carried out by ISIS terrorists southeast of the city of Al-Sukhna in the eastern countryside of Homs," state news agency SANA reported.
The bodies of all victims taken had gunshot wounds to the head, according to the head of Palmyra state hospital head said SANA, per Reuters.
The Islamic State has not yet claimed responsibility for the mass killing.
The attack was carried out by members of the Islamic State riding on motorcycles, according to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR). The militants killed sixteen people foraging for truffles in the same area last weekend, SOHR said.
If the Islamic State claims responsibility for the killings, Friday's attack on the foragers would be the deadliest since the group stormed a prison in the northeastern city of Al-Hasakah last year.
The attack comes just after a senior ISIS leader was killed on Thursday evening in a helicopter raid by US troops in northeastern Syria. An explosion during the raid wounded four American soldiers and their working dog, and they are being treated at a US medical facility in Iraq.
The US military and its partner forces continue to pursue Islamic State fighters in both Iraq and Syria, Insider's Jake Epstein reported.
While the group was driven out of power in the country in 2019, the Islamic State still remains a "global and evolving" threat, the United Nations recently said.
Syria has been embroiled in a civil war and humanitarian crisis since 2011, which has left more than 306,000 civilians dead, according to Human Rights Watch.