The US launched air strikes against Iranian forces and allied militias in Iraq and Syria on Friday, with US President Joe Biden vowing more to come in retaliation for a deadly drone attack on a US base in Jordan.
The US blamed the drone attack on Sunday last week on forces backed by Iran, but did not strike inside the country’s territory on Friday, with both Washington and Tehran seemingly keen to avoid an all-out war.
“Our response began today. It will continue at times and places of our choosing,” Biden said in a statement.
Photo: EPA-EFE
“The United States does not seek conflict in the Middle East or anywhere else in the world. But let all those who might seek to do us harm know this: If you harm an American, we will respond,” he added.
The strikes targeted the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force and “affiliated militia groups,” with US forces — including long-range bombers flown from the US — hitting “more than 85 targets,” the US Central Command said in a statement.
“The airstrikes employed more than 125 precision munitions,” it added.
Targets included command and control and intelligence centers, as well as rocket, missile and drone storage facilities belonging to “militia groups and their IRGC sponsors who facilitated attacks against US and coalition forces.”
The strikes killed at least 18 pro-Iran fighters in Syria’s east, war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Iraqi general Yehia Rasool, a spokesman for Iraqi prime minister, called the strikes a “violation” of his country’s sovereignty and said they would bring “disastrous consequences for the security and stability of Iraq and the region.”
Iraqi Prime Minister Mohamed Shia al-Sudani has called for the departure of international troops from Iraq after a previous US strike in Baghdad.
US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Washington “did inform the Iraqi government prior to the strikes,” but did not elaborate on Baghdad’s response.
Kirby told journalists the strikes lasted about 30 minutes, though they involved a lengthy trip for the B-1 bombers that flew from the US. He said the US Department of Defense was still assessing damage from the strikes, but added that the US believed they were successful and made clear that more would follow.
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights chief Rami Abdel Rahman said that at least 26 major sites housing pro-Iranian groups were destroyed in Syria, including weapons depots.
The strikes represent a “significant escalation,” said Allison McManus, managing director for national security and international policy at the Center for American Progress.
However, she was skeptical about the impact, adding: “We have not seen that similar tit-for-tat strikes have had a deterrent effect.”
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