Pentagon officials said the attacks were a retaliation for recent attacks against US interests in Iraq, including a rocket attack in northern Iraq on February 15 that killed a civilian contractor and wounded a US military and other coalition troops .
Pentagon chief spokesman John Kirby said on Friday that two Air Force F-15E aircraft launched seven missiles, completely destroying nine facilities and severely damaging two other facilities, making the two “functionally destroyed”. He said the facilities, at “entry control points” at the border, were used by militia groups that the US holds responsible for a series of recent attacks against US interests in Iraq.
Kirby said the facilities hit in the attack are close to Boukamal, on the Syrian side of the Iraqi border, along the Euphrates River.
“This place is known to facilitate the activity of militia groups aligned with Iran,” he said. He added that the United States has preliminary information about the victims at the site of the attack, but declined to disclose any details pending the completion of a broader assessment of the damage caused. He described the site as a “complex” that had previously been used by the Islamic State group when it dominated the area.
The Iraqi militia official told the Associated Press that the attacks against Kataeb Hezbollah, or Hezbollah Brigades, reached an area along the border between the Syrian site of Boukamal facing Qaim on the Iraqi side. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak about the attack. War monitoring groups in Syria said the attacks hit trucks carrying weapons to an Iran-supported militia base in Boukamal.
“I am confident in the target we are pursuing, we know what we hit,” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told reporters flying with him from California to Washington, shortly after the air strikes carried out on Thursday night, Eastern Standard Time.
The Biden government in its early weeks emphasized its intention to put more focus on the challenges posed by China, despite the persistence of threats from the Middle East. Biden’s decision to attack Syria did not appear to signal an intention to expand US military involvement in the region, but rather to demonstrate a willingness to defend American troops in Iraq and send a message to Iran.
In the past, the US has targeted facilities in Syria belonging to Kataeb Hezbollah, which it accused of numerous attacks against US officials and interests in Iraq. The Iraqi Kataeb is separated from the Lebanese Hezbollah movement.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British group that monitors the war in Syria, said the attacks targeted a shipment of weapons that were being carried by trucks entering Syrian territories from Iraq. The group said that 22 fighters from the Popular Mobilization Forces, an Iraqi umbrella group made up mainly of Shiite paramilitaries that includes Kataeb Hezbollah, were killed. The report could not be independently verified.
In a statement, the group confirmed that one of its fighters was killed and said it reserved the right to retaliate, without giving further details. Kataeb Hezbollah, like other Iranian-backed factions, maintains fighters in Syria to fight the Islamic State group and help Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces in the civil war in that country.
Defense Secretary Austin said he was “confident” that the United States responded to “the same Shi’ite militants who led the attacks”, referring to a February 15 rocket attack in northern Iraq that killed a contracted civilian and injured a US military. other coalition staff.
Austin said he recommended the action to President Biden.
“We said several times that we would respond to our schedule,” said Austin. “We wanted to make sure of the connectivity and we wanted to make sure that we had the right targets.”
Earlier, Kirby said the US action was a “proportional military response” taken along with diplomatic measures, including consultations with coalition partners.
“The operation sends an unequivocal message: President Biden will act to protect American and coalition personnel,” said Kirby.
Kirby said the US air strikes “destroyed several facilities at a border control point used by several Iranian-backed militant groups”, including Kataeb Hezbollah and Kataeb Sayyid al-Shuhada.
Additional details were not immediately available.
Mary Ellen O’Connell, a professor at Notre Dame Law School, criticized the U.S. attack as a violation of international law.
“The United Nations Charter makes it absolutely clear that the use of military force in the territory of a foreign sovereign state is legal only in response to an armed attack on the defending state for which the target state is responsible,” she said. “None of these elements were found in the strike in Syria.”
Syria condemned the US attack, calling it “a cowardly and systematic American aggression”, warning that the attack will have consequences.
“This aggression is a negative indication of the policies of the new American government, which should adhere to international legitimacy, not jungle law,” said a statement from the Syrian Foreign Ministry.
Biden government officials condemned the February 15 rocket attack near the city of Irbil, in the semi-autonomous region of Iraq, run by the Kurds, but this week officials said they had not yet determined who did it.
Kirby said on Tuesday that Iraq is in charge of investigating the February 15 attack. He added that American officials have been unable to give “a certain attribution to who was behind these attacks”.
A little-known Shi’ite militant group calling itself Saraya Alwiya al-Dam, an Arabic name for Guardians of the Blood Brigade, took responsibility for the February 15 attack. A week later, a rocket attack in the Baghdad Green Zone appeared to target the United States Embassy complex, but no one was hurt.
Iran said this week that it has no ties to the Blood Guardians’ Brigade. Iranian-backed groups have significantly fragmented since the US-led attack that killed Iranian general Qassem Soleimani and Iraqi militia leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis in Baghdad more than a year ago. Both were instrumental in commanding and controlling a wide range of Iranian-backed groups operating in Iraq.
Since their deaths, militias have become increasingly rebellious. Some analysts argue that armed groups have fragmented as a tactic to claim attacks under different names to mask their involvement.
US forces have been reduced significantly in Iraq to 2,500 military personnel and are no longer engaged in combat missions with Iraqi forces in ongoing operations against the Islamic State group.
Baldor and Burns reported from Washington, DC
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