Premonition of a big war: the Pentagon explained the US military strike on Syrian territory

The Pentagon said the United States struck a facility in Syria linked to Iran. The news comes amid growing concerns about an escalating regional conflict in the Middle East.

The US Defense Secretary said the strike on an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-linked facility was in response to at least 40 attacks on US troops in the region since early October.

For the second time in recent weeks, the United States struck a weapons depot in eastern Syria that the Pentagon said was being used by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and affiliated groups.

Since early October, U.S. and U.S.-led coalition troops have been attacked at least 40 times in Iraq and Syria by Iranian-backed forces. At the same time, fears are growing that the war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip could spread to the entire Middle East region. Forty-five US military personnel suffered traumatic brain injuries or minor injuries as a result of the shelling, The Guardian notes.

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement that Wednesday’s strikes were carried out by two US F-15 fighter jets and were in response to recent attacks on US military forces.

Pentagon Chief Austin said attacks on American troops must stop. “If attacks by Iranian proxies against U.S. forces continue, we will not hesitate to take further necessary measures to protect our people,” Austin added.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Wednesday’s airstrike killed nine people linked to Iranian-backed groups in Syria, a death toll that could not be independently confirmed.

As The Guardian recalls, the US has occasionally carried out retaliatory strikes against Iranian-backed forces in the region after they attacked US troops. Thus, on October 26, US forces attacked two facilities used by the IRGC and the groups it supports.

The US has 900 troops in Syria and another 2,500 US troops in neighboring Iraq. According to Washington, they are on a mission to advise and assist local forces trying to prevent the resurgence of the Islamic State (ISIS), which captured large areas of both countries in 2014 but was later defeated.

There is growing concern that the conflict between Israel and Hamas could spread across the Middle East and turn American troops at isolated bases into targets, The Guardian notes.

An armed drone attacked Al-Harir Air Base, which houses US troops in northern Iraq, two security sources told Reuters on Wednesday, after sirens warned of a possible attack on the US embassy in Baghdad.

Sirens sounded outside the US embassy on Wednesday evening, several people in Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone, where the embassy is located, said, but there were no reports of shell hits or casualties.

A U.S. Embassy spokesman and an Iraqi government security official did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

A group called the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a terrorist organization banned in the Russian Federation, claimed responsibility for the latest attack, saying in a statement that it struck al-Harir airbase with two unmanned aerial vehicles.

Earlier on Wednesday, a US MQ-9 drone was also shot down near Yemen by the Iran-backed Houthi movement.

Since the conflict between Israel and Hamas began on October 7, the United States has sent warships and fighter jets, including two aircraft carriers, to the region to try to contain Iran and Iranian-backed groups. The number of military personnel deployed to the region is in the thousands.

The US military is taking new measures to protect its forces in the Middle East as attacks by suspected Iranian-backed groups intensify, leaving open the possibility of evacuating military families if necessary, Reuters reported.

The measures include increasing U.S. military patrols, restricting access to base facilities and stepping up intelligence gathering, including through drones and other surveillance operations, officials said.