US: More civilians may have died in Syria raid that killed top Daesh leader

US military officials have said there could have been more civilian casualties than initially thought in the raid that killed the top Daesh leader in Syria last week.

Officials also said on Thursday they believe any such deaths were caused by the militant's suicide bomb and were not at the hands of American forces.

Laying out a chronology of the raid by special operations forces, officials said they cannot be certain that Abu Ibrahim al Hashimi al Qurayshi detonated the bomb that killed him and his family at his home in the sleepy village of Atmeh near the Turkish border.

But they said it was set off by him or someone else on the third floor of the building where he lived. 

Previously the Pentagon and President Joe Biden had said al Qurayshi blew up himself, his wife and two children. 

The military officials said on Thursday they believe the upper floor was rigged to explode and that it's most likely al Qurayshi did it, not one of his family members.

They also said it's possible that others — perhaps additional wives he had — could have been with him and killed in that blast.

They said the blast threw “multiple bodies” from the building and buried them in the rubble, and while they know al Qurayshi and his family died, they can't rule out the possibility that other bodies were hidden in the collapse and not seen by the troops.

READ MORE: ‘Canary Caliph’: Who was the head of Daesh killed by the US?

National security claims

Speaking to a small group of reporters, two senior military officials involved in the planning or execution of the operation provided the most details to date on the February 2 raid.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, they pushed back against claims by residents and activist groups that the US operation killed as many as 13 people, including civilians. 

The Biden administration and the Pentagon have come under sharp criticism recently for failing to provide evidence for a number of national security claims.

This includes proof of their efforts to avoid civilian casualties in operations such as the Syria raid and their account of a suicide bombing in Afghanistan in August.

A journalist on assignment for The Associated Press as well as several village residents said they saw body parts scattered near the site of the Syria raid, a house in the rebel-held Idlib province. 

The officials said two al Qaida-linked militants with automatic weapons approached the house in an effort to attack the US forces and were killed. But the officials said other armed citizens in the area were not harmed because they did not pose a threat.

The officials also revealed that the US, which wanted to capture al Qurayshi alive, had made plans to turn him over to another government. 

One official said the US would have detained him temporarily, but there were no plans for a long-term US detention. They declined to provide further details, saying they wanted to protect “government-to-government” discussions.

READ MORE: US kills top Daesh leader and over a dozen civilians in Syria