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 It was the second U.S. air strike in three months against Islamic
State in Libya, where the hardline Islamist militants have exploited
years of chaos following Muammar Gaddafi's 2011 overthrow to build
up a presence on the southern shores of the Mediterranean Sea.
The Pentagon said it had targeted an Islamic State training camp.
The facility in the city of Sabratha was linked to Noureddine
Chouchane, a Tunisian blamed by his native country for attacks last
year on a Tunis museum and the Sousse beach resort, which killed
dozens of tourists.
"Destruction of the camp and Chouchane's removal will eliminate an
experienced facilitator and is expected to have an immediate impact
on ISIL's ability to facilitate its activities in Libya, including
recruiting new ISIL members, establishing bases in Libya, and
potentially planning external attacks on U.S. interests in the
region," the Pentagon said, using an acronym for Islamic State, also
known as ISIS or Daesh.
 U.S. officials said Chouchane is most likely dead but White House
spokesman Josh Earnest said he could not yet confirm the results of
the air assault. He said the raid showed U.S. willingness to fight
Islamic State.
"It's an indication that the president will not hesitate to take
these kinds of forceful, decisive actions," Earnest said.
In Libya, photos released by the municipal authorities showed a
massive crater in gray earth. Several wounded men lay bandaged in
hospital.
The mayor of Sabratha, Hussein al-Thwadi, told Reuters the planes
hit a building in the city's Qasr Talil district, home to many
foreigners.
Locals officials said 43 people were killed.
The strikes targeted a house in a residential district west of the
center, municipal authorities said in a statement.
The house had been rented to foreigners including Tunisians
suspected of belonging to Islamic State, and medium-caliber weapons
including machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades had been found
in the rubble, the statement said.
The air strikes came just days after a warning by President Barack
Obama that Washington intended to "take actions where we've got a
clear operation and a clear target in mind" against Islamic State.
Britain said it had authorized the use of its airbases to launch the
attack.
Islamic State runs a self-styled caliphate across swathes of Iraq
and Syria, where it has faced air strikes from a U.S.-led coalition
since 2014.
DEEPER INTO CHAOS
Since Gaddafi was overthrown five years ago by rebel forces backed
by NATO air strikes, Libya has slipped deeper into chaos, with two
rival governments each backed by competing factions of former rebel
brigades.
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A U.N.-backed government of national accord is trying to win
support, but is still awaiting parliamentary approval. It is opposed
by factional hardliners and has yet to establish itself in the
capital Tripoli.
Islamic State has expanded, attacking oil ports and taking over
Gaddafi's home city of Sirte, now the militant group's most
important stronghold outside its main redoubts in Syria and Iraq.
Calls have increased for a swift Western response to stop the group
establishing itself more permanently and using Libya as a base for
attacks on neighbours Tunisia and Egypt.
Western officials and diplomats have said air strikes and special
forces operations are possible as well as an Italian-led "security
stabilisation" plan of training and advising.
U.S. and European officials have in the past insisted Libyans must
first form a united government and ask for help, but they also say
they may still carry out unilateral action if needed.
The United States estimates that the number of militants directly
affiliated with Islamic State or sympathetic to it now operating in
Libya is in the “low thousands,” or less than 5,000, a U.S.
government source said.
Last November the United States carried out an air strike on the
Libyan town of Derna, close to the Egyptian border, to kill Abu
Nabil, an Iraqi commander in Islamic State.
A U.S. air strike targeted veteran Algerian militant Mokhtar
Belmokhtar and other jihadists meeting in eastern Libya last June.
His fate is unclear.
(Additional reporting by Warren Strobel and Mark Hosenball and
Roberta Rampton in Washington and Michelle Nichols at the United
Nations; Writing by Dominic Evans and Peter Graff; Editing by
Patrick Markey, Alison Williams, Andrew Roche and Alistair Bell)
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