Pentagon: US strikes ‘Iranian-backed’ militants in Syria
Monitoring Desk :
The United States military struck facilities in eastern Syria used by ‘Iranian-backed’ militant group on Thursday. Pentagon said the new US administration under Joe Biden was sending a strong message to Iran in the aftermath of an attack on US troops in Iraq.
In its first military action against Iran-backed groups since Biden became president five weeks ago, the US Defence Department said it had carried out airstrikes at a Syria-Iraq border control point used by those groups, destroying “multiple facilities”.
“At President Biden’s direction, US military forces earlier this evening conducted airstrikes against infrastructure utilized by Iranian-backed militant groups in eastern Syria,” said spokesman John Kirby in a statement.
“These strikes were authorized in response to recent attacks against American and Coalition personnel in Iraq, and to ongoing threats to that personnel,” he said.
17 reported killed
Kirby did not say whether there were any casualties in Thursday’s attack.
But the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that 17 people were killed after the strike hit three trucks loaded with munitions coming from Iraq near the Syrian city of Bukamal.
The group said all the dead were from Iraq’s state-sponsored Hashed al-Shaabi force, the umbrella group over many small militias that allegedly have ties to Iran.
Kirby said the location was used by Kataeb Hezbollah and Kataeb Sayyid al-Shuhada, two armed Iraqi militants groups under Hashed al-Shaabi.
Pentagon: US strikes ‘Iranian-backed’ militants in Syria
