According to a report carried by Iraq's al-Sumaria news website, the Daesh terrorist group on Sunday had planned to launch a major offensive on Samarra with the help of 12 suicide bombers and explosive-laden cars.
However, the Iraqi fighter jets, after receiving intelligence about the pre-planned attack, foiled the terrorists' attack by targeting their positions in the suburbs of the city.
More than 40 terrorists, including ringleaders, were killed in the process of the raids.
Iraq has been facing the growing threat of terrorism, mainly posed by the ISIL terrorist group.
The ISIL militants made advances in northern and western Iraq over summer 2014, after capturing swaths of northern Syria.
However, a combination of concentrated attacks by the Iraqi military and the volunteer forces, who rushed to take arms after top Iraqi cleric Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani issued a fatwa calling for fight against the militants, blunted the edge of the ISIL offensive and in recent months led to liberation of much of the territories occupied by Daesh.
