ISIS finance chief has been confirmed killed in a coalition air raid last month, U.S. officials said Thursday. Abu Saleh was killed in late November, U.S. military spokesman Col. Steve Warren said in a video conference from Baghdad, calling him "one of the most senior and experienced members" of the group's financial network. The U.S. government's envoy for the anti-ISIS fight, Brett McGurk, said on Twitter that Abu Saleh was killed along with two associates "as part of coalition campaign to destroy [Daesh's] financial infrastructure," describing him as the group's "finance minister." Abu Saleh's real name is Muwaffaq Mustafa Muhammad al-Karmush, described in a State Department terrorist blacklist as a 42-year-old Iraqi. "He was one of the most senior and experienced members of ISIL's financial network and he was a legacy Al-Qaeda member," Warren said., using another name for Daesh. "Killing him and his predecessors exhausts the knowledge and talent needed to coordinate funding within the organization." The military spokesmen said two other figures in ISIS fundraising networks also were killed in coalition airstrikes in late November. They were identified as Abu Mariam, an enforcer and senior leader in ISIS extortion networks, and Abu Waqman al-Tunis, who Warren said coordinated ISIS transfer of people, weapons and information. Abu Mariam appears on the State Department terrorist list as Mounir Ben Dhaou Ben Brahim Ben Helal, a 32-year-old Tunisian. After the attacks in Paris last month, the U.S. said it was deploying a special operations unit in Iraq that will be able to mount raids into Syria to capture or kill ISIS leaders. In London, the U.S. Treasury's acting undersecretary for terrorism and financial crimes, Adam Szubin, said ISIS derived most of its funding from economic activity in the territory it controls. It has reaped over $500 million in black market oil sales, looted banks captured in Iraq and Syria, and raised millions more through extortion. On the ground in Syria, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Daesh Thursday recaptured two areas in central Syria from government forces. "Syrian army units withdrew from all of the Maheen and Hawareen areas after a Daesh attack," said Rami Abdel-Rahman, head of the activist group. The two areas had previously been held by ISIS, but in late November the army and pro-regime militias were able to recapture them. Abdel-Rahman said fierce fighting was raging between regime forces and ISIS in the hills around the two areas. In nearby Sadad, a local representative said the army had deployed to secure an exit route for regime forces fighting the militants, "who are trying to encircle and isolate them." The Christian town of Sadad, some 18 kilometers from the city of Homs in central Syria, had been preparing for the possibility of a ISIS assault before regime forces recaptured Maheen and Hawareen. Sadad has been a battlefield before, changing hands between regime and rebel forces several times in late 2013 before government troops finally secured control. Elsewhere, buses carrying rebel fighters and their families safely reached the northwestern city of Idlib Thursday after withdrawing from Homs under a local cease-fire agreement, the Observatory said. Four buses arrived in Idlib overnight out of around 15 that left Homs, and the rest arrived during the day Thursday, Abdel-Rahman said. Lebanon-based al Mayadeen TV, which has good contacts in Syria, reported the "operation was completed" Thursday. Meanwhile, the Britain-based Observatory said the toll in airstrikes on the town of Hammourieh in Eastern Ghouta outside the capital Damascus had risen to 19 dead, including six children. The activist group added that it was unclear whether the strikes were carried out by regime or Russian warplanes. Eastern Ghouta is a rebel stronghold outside the capital and is regularly targeted by the regime. Triple car bombs exploded in a town in northeastern Syria's predominantly Kurdish province of Hassakeh, killing 15 civilians and wounding dozens more, Syria's state-run news agency said. It added that one of the explosions took place near a medical center and another at a crowded market in the town of Tal Tamr, noting that the vehicles were packed with large amounts of explosives and significantly damaged shops and businesses. The Observatory said at least 12 people were killed in the attacks, adding that the death toll was likely to rise due to the large number of wounded and missing. It said the exploding vehicles were likely tankers. Tal Tamr is an overwhelmingly Kurdish town where the main Kurdish fighting force in Syria – People's Protection Units, or YPG – is in control. The group is the most effective fighting force ISIS. There was no claim of responsibility. The first batch of German troops and aircraft took off Thursday for Turkey as part of a deployment in the battle against ISIS. Forty soldiers and two Tornado reconnaissance jets left from the Jagel military air base in northern Germany's Schleswig-Holstein state.
