01 September, 2017
The decision was met with outrage in Iraq and by the US-led global coalition against Isis, which, along with the Syrian army, is fighting for control of the militants' last areas of control in northeast Syria and on the Iraqi border.
The US-led coalition against Isis has carried out an air strike to stop jihadists evacuated from fighting in Lebanon from reaching militant strongholds in east Syria, Central Command has said.
The coalition said it had not hit the convoy, but "cratered" a road in east Syria and bombed IS vehicles nearby.
"We are monitoring their location in real time", he said, adding that the coalition "will not rule out strikes against ISIS fighters being moved".
On August 28th hundreds of ISIS fighters were allowed to board buses in the Qalamoun mountains on the border of Lebanon and Syria and drive to eastern Syria near Deir ez-Zor. It says its offensive against Islamic State last week was separate to the simultaneous one made against the same pocket from inside Syria by the Syrian army and Hezbollah, regarded by the US and Britain as a terrorist group.
He said Hezbollah fighters and Syrian troops are engaged in the battle for the province.
The ceasefire took effect on Sunday and saw a convoy of 308 militants with small arms and 331 civilians leave the border area under Syrian army escort.
US officials say their patrols in northern Syria have come under fire several times from areas controlled by Turkish-backed Syrian forces, sparking a protest from Washington.
According to the deal, around 600 terrorists and family members have now left Lebanon and crossed the border into eastern Syria. Another U.S. official said the U.S. believed the relocated ISIS fighters meant to cross into Iraq, but that the convoy has not yet crossed the border.
"We have obvious concerns, however, for any action that provides ISIS capabilities to shift its forces and thus put more civilians in harm's way", said Edgar Vasquez, a regional spokesman for the U.S. State Department.
After a weeklong offensive by the Lebanese army, the Syrian government and Lebanese Hezbollah fighters, more than 300 ISIS fighters and about as many of their relatives withdrew from their enclave on the Syria-Lebanon border.
The transfer angered some in Iraq, who accused Lebanon, Hezbollah and the Syrian government of threatening Iraq's security by moving ISIS close to their border.
The top USA envoy for the worldwide coalition against ISIS, Brett McGurk, tweeted Wednesday that ISIS "terrorists should be killed on the battlefield, not bused across #Syria to the Iraqi border without #Iraq's consent".
Responding to the criticism but not addressing the airstrikes, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said in a statement that negotiating with the militants was the "only way" to resolve the "humanitarian and national" issue of finding the remains of nine Lebanese soldiers that the militants kidnapped in 2014.
Trump also pledged more support for Lebanon, saying, "America's assistance can help ensure that the Lebanese army is the only defender Lebanon needs".
