U.S. forces resume ISIS fight in Syria

U.S. troops have resumed large-scale counterterror­ism missions against ISIS in northern Syria, military officials said, nearly two months after President Donald Trump's abrupt order to withdraw U.S. troops opened the way for a bloody Turkish cross-border offensive. U.S.-backed operations against ISIS in the area ground to a halt for weeks despite warnings from intelligence analysts that ISIS militants were beginning to make a comeback from Syrian desert redoubts even though their leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, had been killed during a U.S. raid on Oct. 26. On Friday, U.S. soldiers and hundreds of Syrian Kurdish fighters — the same allies the Trump administration abandoned against the Turkish advance last month — reunited to conduct what the Pentagon said was a large-scale mission to kill and capture ISIS fighters in Deir el-Zour Province. "Over the next days and weeks, the pace will pick back up against remnants of ISIS," said Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, commander of Central Command.