On Saturday, February 22, the Islamic State claimed the death of three members of the Syrian Defense Ministry in northeastern Syria, two days after it claimed responsibility for another attack in Deir ez-Zor province.
The organization said in a statement published through the agency “Dabiq” affiliated to it, that it targeted a member of the Syrian army in the city of Mayadeen in the province of Deir ez-Zor using a pistol, and attacked two others with machine guns in the village of Wasta in the northern countryside of Raqqa, killing them.
The organization’s announcement follows a previous statement issued last Thursday, in which it adopted an attack that it said killed a member of the Syrian government and injured another in the countryside of Deir ez-Zor, in a sign of the continued activity of its cells in the region despite the military decline suffered during the past years.
For its part, the Information and Communication Department of the Syrian Ministry of Defense said that “a member of the Ministry of Defense was subjected to an operation by unknown persons in the village of Wasta in the northern countryside of Raqqa, which led to his death with a civilian immediately,” without explicitly referring to the identity of the executing party.
Areas of northeastern Syria, especially the countryside of Deir ez-Zor, Raqqa and Hasakah governorates, have been witnessing from time to time targeting of elements of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) during their control of the region, in addition to local and civilian notables, most of which are attributed to cells belonging to ISIS.
Audio recording that brings organization back to the fore
The organization returned to the forefront of events on Friday, through an audio recording attributed to its official spokesman, “Abi Hudhaifa al-Ansari,” which included a direct attack on the Syrian government.
According to Enab Baladi, the recording focused on describing the Syrian government as “secular,” calling for it to be confronted, with hints to official figures, and suggesting that the fate of some of them would not be different from the end of the former regime’s president.
The recording also included a description of the Syrian scene as a transition from Iranian to Turkish and American influence, in an attempt to reframe the political reality to serve the organization’s ideological narrative and maintain its symbolic presence despite its losses on the ground.
This comes at a time when local and international reports speak of renewed activity of ISIS cells in the Syrian desert and areas east of the Euphrates, taking advantage of security interferences, the expansion of the geographical area and the difficulty of controlling it completely.
Last January, the Islamic State claimed four operations, three of which were against the SDF in exchange for one operation it had claimed against the government.
The organization also announced in a statistic published by the agency “Amaq”, the implementation of 136 attacks in Syria, recording 228 cases, between dead and wounded, among the 1218 attacks recorded in 13 countries in Asia and Europe during 2025.
Intermittent activity in Deir Ezzor and Raqqa
Over the past months, the eastern and western countryside of Deir ez-Zor have witnessed sporadic assassinations targeting elements of government forces and others from the SDF, in addition to attacks on checkpoints and military points, often adopted by the organization through its media identifiers.
The city of Al-Mayadeen and its countryside are among the most prominent areas where ISIS cells are active, due to their geographical nature and proximity to the desert, where there are still frequent attacks against government forces.
In Raqqa, during the past two years, there have been repeated incidents of targeting explosive devices or direct shooting against military and security elements, amid security campaigns carried out by the SDF periodically to pursue active cells.
The organization lost its spatial control in Syria in 2019, after battles that ended in the town of Baghouz in the eastern countryside of Deir ez-Zor, but it maintained its presence through mobile cells carrying out lightning operations.
The group’s data from time to time confirms its continued activity in various areas of Syria, especially in the desert and east of the Euphrates.
While the international coalition periodically announces the implementation of security operations to pursue its elements and dismantle its networks, where the US Central Command announced the implementation of more than 10 raids targeting more than 30 sites of the organization between 3 and 12 February 2026.
The raids in Syria included communications sites, logistics and weapons, in an attempt to weaken the capabilities of the organization and drain its hideouts, in a move described by the sources as the continuation of US military pressure after the loss of the organization’s major territories. Thousands of detainees have also been transferred to Iraqi detention facilities to ensure they are not exploited in any future operations.
The latest developments come in the context of the escalation of the media discourse of the organization, in parallel with the adoption of sporadic operations, reflecting an attempt to highlight its field and media presence in light of the political and military transformations taking place in the northeastern regions of Syria.