United States Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth has revealed tha President Donald Trump ordered the Pentagon to pay special attention to protecting Christians in Nigeria being targeted by ISIS-linked extremists.
About a year ago, Trump gave the decision after he learned about attacks on Christian communities in Nigeria, Hegseth said, according to a Wednesday White House press conference.
He said Trump has personally instructed the Department of War to increase measures to protect vulnerable people.
And he heard the cries of Nigerian Christians being attacked and killed by ISIS in Nigeria, and he told me, “Pete, I want the War Department to do everything possible to protect those Christians,” Hegseth recounted.
“The directive led to coordinated military planning and deployment of intelligence-backed operations,” he said.
“We put the proper assets in place and in the last month — which hasn’t gotten much media coverage — we took out the ISIS number two in Nigeria who was deeply involved in atrocities against Christians and threats against the U.S. homeland,” he said.
The dead fighter was Abu-Bilal al-Minuki, the man believed to be the No. 2 leader of the ISIS affiliate in the region, Hegseth said. He said the operation was carried out jointly by U.S. and Nigerian military in the Lake Chad Basin.
“Information from the mission was used in a larger operation that resulted in the killing of multiple ISIS operatives,” he said.
“We have neutralized hundreds of ISIS fighters who were involved in attacks on Christians in Nigeria based on the intelligence we recovered,” he claimed.
“This operation reflects the Trump administration’s overall counterterrorism strategy and its commitment to protecting civilians in conflict zones,” the military chief said.
“There are a lot of operations the public doesn’t hear about, but the President has given the department the green light to be aggressive in defense of the American people and others that are at risk,” Hegseth added.
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