ANTALYA, Turkey — Obama administration officials said Sunday that the United States would not alter its strategy against the Islamic State in response to Friday’s terror attacks in Paris, despite evidence that the terrorist group was expanding its ability to strike Western targets.
Later in the day, the French Defense Ministry said France was already hitting back, bombarding Raqqa, the Islamic State-held city in north-central Syria. The ministry said 10 jets dropped 20 bombs in a “massive” raid launched from bases in the United Arab Emirates and Jordan.
The Defense Ministry said that in coordination with U.S. forces, “bombs were dropped” on facilities used by the militant group, which claimed responsibility for the Paris killings.
Activists in Raqqa confirmed the bombardment on social media, describing the attacks as unusually intense and knocking out electricity to the city of about 200,000 people.
In Iraq on Sunday, foreign minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari said Iraqi intelligence had obtained information earlier that the Islamic State was planning an imminent terrorist attack overseas that may have been targeting “in particular” France, the United States and Iran.
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