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US troops attacked in Syria after strikes

Iraq condemns US air strikes as an ‘unacceptable violation of sovereignty’.

Iraq condemns US air strikes as an ‘unacceptable violation of sovereignty’. Photo: Twitter

US troops came under rocket fire in Syria on Monday (local time), but escaped injury, in apparent retaliation for weekend US air strikes against Iran-aligned militia in Syria and Iraq.

A US military spokesman said US forces had responded to the multiple rockets by firing back at the positions in self-defence.

“There are no (US) injuries and damage is being assessed,” Colonel Wayne Marotto said, referring to the rocket attack.

He did not say who was responsible for the attack on US troops.

Sources in Deir al Zor, in eastern Syria, said an Iranian-backed militia group had fired a few artillery rounds in the vicinity of al Omar oil field, which is controlled by the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces.

The rocket fire underscored the risk of escalation and the limits of US military firepower to restrain Iran-aligned militias that Washington blames for a series of increasingly sophisticated drone strikes against US personnel and facilities in Iraq.

Hours earlier, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and the White House had defended the US strikes in Iraq and Syria on Sunday local time as a way to tamp down on the risk of conflict.

“We took necessary, appropriate, deliberate action that is designed to limit the risk of escalation, but also to send a clear and unambiguous deterrent message,” Mr Blinken told reporters in Rome.

Iraqi militia groups aligned with Iran in a statement named four members of the Kataib Sayyed al-Shuhada faction they said were killed in the attack on the Syria-Iraq border. They vowed to retaliate.

But it was not immediately clear who fired the latest salvo at US forces.

Iraq’s government, wary of getting dragged into a US-Iran conflict, had condemned the US strikes on its territory and said it would “study all legal options” to prevent such action from being repeated. Syria called the strikes a “flagrant violation of the sanctity of Syrian and Iraqi lands.”

Iraq’s military issued a condemnation of the US strikes.

The Iraqi and US militaries coordinate closely in a separate battle in Iraq, fighting remnants of the Sunni extremist group Islamic State.

It was the second time President Joe Biden had ordered retaliatory strikes against Iran-backed militias since taking office five months ago. He ordered limited strikes in Syria in February, that time in response to rocket attacks in Iraq.

Two US officials, speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity, said Iran-backed militias have carried out at least five drone attacks against facilities used by US and coalition personnel in Iraq since April.

Biden’s administration has been looking to potentially revive a 2015 nuclear deal with Iran. The attacks underscore how Biden aims to compartmentalise such defensive strikes, while simultaneously engaging Tehran in diplomacy.

-AAP

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