Turkey says it has carried out airstrikes on Islamic State targets in Syria, in a significant escalation of its involvement in the battle against the extremist group.

Three F-16s took off from Diyarbakir in southeast Turkey early Friday and struck targets across the Turkish border province of Kilis, according to the prime minister’s office.

The statement said the jets dropped four guided bombs on a pair of Islamic State headquarters and a meeting point before returning safely to their base.

The decision to carry out the strikes was made late Thursday at a meeting of security officials headed by Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, it added.

It is the first time Turkey has launched airstrikes against Islamic State targets in Syria.

Also Friday, Turkish officials said 251 people were detained during a massive dawn police raid on IS and Kurdish militant locations across the country.

More than 5,000 officers, backed by helicopters, raided at least 100 locations across Istanbul in search of the militants, according to media reports.

The operations come after Turkey reportedly agreed this week to let U.S. fighter planes use Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey to launch attacks on Islamic State militants inside Syria.

Neither Turkey nor the U.S. has publicly confirmed the deal. But reports in several media outlets said the agreement was finalized during a phone call Wednesday between Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and U.S. President Barack Obama.

The U.S. military has long operated at the Incirlik base, but Turkey has rejected repeated requests by Washington to use the base for attacks against Islamic State.

The air base is about 400 kilometers from Raqqa, the Islamic State stronghold in Syria, and would sharply cut the length of the 1,900-kilometer bombing runs the U.S. has been carrying out from Iraq into Syria.

The U.S.-led coalition has launched thousands of bombing runs on Islamic State positions in Syria and Iraq and says it has had some success in halting the militants’ advance. But the Islamic State group still controls wide swaths of northern and western Iraq and northern Syria just across the border from Turkey.

In recent weeks Turkey has seen itself drawn into more cross-border clashes.

On Thursday, Islamic State fighters in Syria and the Turkish military engaged in a skirmish that left at least one Turkish officer dead.

Thirty-two people, mostly young activists preparing for an aid mission to Syria, were killed Monday in a devastating suicide bombing in Suruc, Turkey. The Turkish government for the first time blamed the Islamic State for the assault.

Two days later, two Turkish police were shot dead near the Syrian border. The Kurdistan Worker’s Party, or PKK, claimed the attack, saying it was retaliation for the Turkish government colluding with the Islamic State. Turkey denies the charges.
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