US officials confirmed on Friday that an American fighting for a Takfiri group in Syria carried out a deadly suicide bombing in the northern province of Idlib.

US officials confirmed on Friday that an American fighting for a Takfiri group in Syria carried out a deadly suicide bombing in the northern province of Idlib.

"The American citizen involved in the suicide bombing in Syria is believed to be Moner Mohammad Abu-Salha," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement.

Abu-Salha is believed to have been behind a truck bombing against government forces last Sunday in Idlib.

The man called by the nom de guerre Abu Hurayra Al-Amriki was a U.S. citizen, who grew up in Florida and went to school there.

Psaki agreed it was believed to be the first such suicide bombing carried out by an American since the start of the Syrian crisis in 2011.

Estimates of the number of foreign extremist fighters who have flooded into Syria in the past three years range from between 9,000 to 11,000, with most believed to have come from neighboring countries.

Psaki could not give precise figures of how many Americans may be among them.
But The New York Times said about 100 Americans are believed to have traveled to Syria, mainly to join the Takfiri groups fighting the Syrian government.

Abu-Salha is believed to have spent two months in a training camp in the divided city of Aleppo, and was on his second visit to Syria, having returned there late last year, The New York Times reported.

Abu-Salha was named with the help of witnesses and family members, the Times reported, citing law enforcement officials who believe his remains may never be properly identified due to the force of the blast.