US captures ISIS fighter in Iraq

A U.S. Special Operations team captured a man suspected of being an operative with the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) during a recent raid in northern Iraq, according to multiple reports Wednesday.

{mosads}The New York Times characterized the fighter as a “significant” ISIS operative, and his capture raises fresh questions on tactics in the fight against ISIS, which the U.S. has mostly fought from the air.

American officials were interrogating the detainee, who has not been identified, at a temporary detention facility in Erbil and plan to eventually release him to Iraqi or Kurdish officials, officials told the Times.

Defense Secretary Ashton Carter announced in December that the U.S. was sending about 200 special operations troops to Iraq, and reports indicated they arrived in recent weeks.

The fighter is at least the second person who has been captured and questioned in the anti-ISIS campaign after Umm Sayyaf, the wife of ISIS oil and gas operative Abu Sayyaf, who was killed during a U.S. raid in Syria last year.

Umm Sayyef was transferred to Kurdish custody in August after being held for three months following the May raid and was charged last month by the Department of Justice for supporting terrorism that helped kill a U.S. citizen abroad.