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Pentagon looking into reported death of Islamic State's 'White Widow'

By Sara Shayanian

Oct. 12 (UPI) -- The Pentagon said it's looking into reports that a British Islamic State supporter known as the "White Widow" was killed by an airstrike this summer.

The woman, Sally Jones, converted to Islam in 2013 and became known to authorities for traveling to Syria to join her militant husband. She was dubbed the "White Widow" for regular recruiting activity on her social media accounts.

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"I do not have any information that would substantiate that report but that could change and we are looking into this," Pentagon spokesman Maj Adrian Rankine-Galloway said, The Guardian reported Thursday.

Officials said conditions on the ground prevent them from knowing for certain if Jones is dead, but her social media activity has been silent for months.

British Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn said Thursday that he would have preferred to see Jones face trial.

"When you interrogate someone, you get more information," he said.

Both Rankine-Galloway and Corbyn were responding to a report Thursday by The Sun that cited CIA officials in reporting Jones' death -- by a drone strike in June near the Syria-Iraq border.

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News of Jones' death, though, hasn't been disclosed due to concern that her 12-year-old son also died in the strike, The Guardian report said.

Jones' husband, militant Junaid Hussain, was killed by a similar drone strike two years ago.

Authorities say after her husband's death, Jones, a former punk musician from Greenwich, Britain, began recruiting women online to join the militant group. Officials say she provided practical advice on how to travel to Syria and guidance on how to build homemade weapons to carry out attacks in Britain.

Jones is among many suspected IS operatives on a United Nations sanctions list, which includes a travel ban and a freeze on her assets.

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