Free Republic

US Special Forces reportedly carried out a failed rescue mission in Raqqa to save the captured Jordanian pilot held prisoner by Islamic State (ISIS) militants. The operation is believed to have taken place on 1 January. US Special Forces were attempting to rescue Muadh al-Kasasbeh, the Jordanian pilot who ended up in the hands of ISIS after his F-16 crashed in Raqqa on 24 December. The operation failed after US forces came under heavy fire from the ISIS. The rescue mission was confirmed by local activists,who claimed that on the day of the operation, the coalition carried out over 13...

According to unconfirmed reports, the U.S. launched a special operations mission to recover the Jordanian Air Force pilot captured by IS militants after he was forced to abandon his F-16 over Iraq on Dec. 24, 2014. However, the mission had to be aborted after the commando, heading towards a private house in Al-Raqqa, in the northern part of central Syria, where the Royal Jordanian Air Force pilot was hidden, lost the element of surprise and the helicopters came under heavy fire. The news was reported by Israel News media outlet, but the source are rebels in Syria according to Turkish...

The Jordanian plane that crashed in Syria was not shot down by Islamic State (IS) militants, the US says. The plane was lost in IS territory on Wednesday morning, and the pilot has been captured. IS militants said that they shot down the plane with a heat-seeking missile. However, the US says "evidence clearly indicates" that this is not true. Jordan is one of four Arab states in a US-led coalition that has launched air strikes on IS targets in Syria. The plane is the first coalition aircraft to be lost on IS territory since air strikes began in September....

The Islamic State group captured a Jordanian pilot after shooting down his warplane over Syria, Jordan said Wednesday, in the extremists' first successful downing of an aircraft from the international coalition waging an air campaign against the extremists. The show of the extremists' capabilities underscored the risks for the United States and the multiple Arab and European countries whose warplanes are participating in bombing campaign aimed at pushing back the jihadis' control across much of Syria and Iraq. It also posed Jordan with a nightmare scenario ? its pilot was the first foreign soldier to fall into the extremists' hands....

One of the anti-ISIS air coalition's biggest fears have come true: A pilot being captured by ISIS militants. The Jordanian F-16AM was flying over the ISIS stronghold of Raqqa, Syria this morning when some say it was engaged by a shoulder-fired heat seeking missile.

A prisoner exchange may be in the cards for a Jordanian pilot captured by Islamic State fighters after his plane crashed in Syria, according to a report in the Arab press. Jordanian political activists told the London-based daily Al-Quds al-Arabi on Thursday that a prisoner exchange could be possible if the Jordanian government released people affiliated with the group al-Qaida in Iraq, the precursor to Islamic State. Tareq al-Fayed, a Jordanian political activist close to the Salafist movement mentioned Sajida al-Rishawi, an Iraqi woman who was caught trying to blow herself up in a failed suicide bombing during a wedding...

A warplane has been downed in an Islamic State-controlled region of Syria and the pilot taken captive, according to both a monitoring group and supporters of the extremist group. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which is based in Britain, said the plane came down near Raqqa - a major Islamic State stronghold. *** 3 hours ago Jordan Army confirms pilot captured by Islamic State The Jordan Army has confirmed one of its pilots has been captured in Syria during coalition air raids. In a statement, the army said Islamic State "bears responsibility for his safety". The pilot has been...