Pentagon officials said the attacks were in retaliation for recent attacks on US interests in Iraq, including a missile strike in northern Iraq on Feb. 15 that killed a civilian contractor and injured a US military member and other coalition forces.
John Kirby, the Pentagon’s chief spokesman, said on Friday that two Air Force F-15E planes fired seven missiles, completely destroyed nine facilities and severely damaged two other facilities, causing the two to be “functionally destroyed.” He said the facilities, at “access control points” at the border, had been used by militias who believe the US is responsible for a number of recent attacks on US interests in Iraq.
Kirby said the facilities hit in the attack were located near Boukamal, on the Syrian side of the border with Iraq, along the Euphrates River.
“This location is known to facilitate the activities of militia groups in the Iranian line,” he said. He added that the US has preliminary information on victims at the scene of the attack, but declined to release details pending the completion of a broader assessment of the damage inflicted. He described the site as a ‘compound’ previously used by the Islamic State group when it ruled the area.
The Iraqi militia official told The Associated Press that the attacks on the Kataeb Hezbollah, or Hezbollah Brigades, hit an area along the border between the Syrian site of Boukamal opposite Qaim on the Iraqi side. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak about the attack. Syria war-monitoring groups said the attacks hit trucks carrying weapons to a base for Iranian-backed militias in Boukamal.
“I have faith in the target we were chasing, we know what we hit,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin told reporters who flew with him from California to Washington shortly after the airstrikes carried out on Thursday night Eastern Standard Time.
In the early weeks, the Biden administration has emphasized its intention to pay more attention to China’s challenges, even as threats in the Middle East persist. Biden’s decision to attack in Syria did not seem to indicate an intention to increase US military involvement in the region, but rather to show a will to defend US forces in Iraq and send a message to Iran .
The US has in the past targeted facilities in Syria of Kataeb Hezbollah, which it has blamed for numerous attacks on US personnel and interests in Iraq. The Iraqi Kataeb is separate from the Lebanese Hezbollah movement.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based group that monitors the war in Syria, said the attacks targeted a shipment of weapons carried by trucks driving into Syrian areas from Iraq. The group said 22 fighters from the Popular Mobilization Forces, an Iraqi umbrella group of mostly Shia paramilitaries, including Kataeb Hezbollah, were killed. The report could not be independently verified.
In a statement, the group confirmed that one of its hunters had been killed and said it reserved the right to retaliate without elaborating. Kataeb Hezbollah, like other Iranian-backed factions, maintains fighters in Syria to fight both the Islamic State group and assist the forces of Syrian President Bashar Assad in that country’s civil war.
Defense Secretary Austin said he was “ certain ” that the US had hit back on “ the same Shia militants who carried out the attacks, ” referring to a Feb. 15 missile strike in Northern Iraq that killed a civilian contractor and a American military was injured. other coalition personnel.
Austin said he recommended the move to President Biden.
“We have said a number of times that we will comment on our timeline,” said Austin. “We wanted to be sure of connectivity and we wanted to make sure we had the right goals.”
Previously, Kirby said the US action was a “proportionate military response,” along with diplomatic action, including consultation with coalition partners.
“The operation sends an unambiguous message: President Biden will act to protect US and coalition personnel,” Kirby said.
Kirby said the US airstrikes “destroyed multiple facilities at a border control point used by a number of Iranian-backed militant groups,” including Kataeb Hezbollah and Kataeb Sayyid al-Shuhada.
Further details were not readily available.
Mary Ellen O’Connell, a professor at Notre Dame Law School, criticized the US attack as a violation of international law.
“The United Nations Charter makes absolutely clear that the use of military force on the territory of a foreign sovereign state is permissible only in response to an armed attack on the defending state for which the target state is responsible,” she said. “None of these elements are encountered in the Syria attack.”
Syria condemned the US strike, calling it “a cowardly and systematic US aggression” and warning that the attack will have consequences.
“This aggression is a negative indication of the policy of the new US administration, which is believed to conform to international legitimacy, not the law of the jungle,” said a statement by the Syrian State Department.
Biden government officials condemned the February 15 missile attack near the city of Irbil in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region, but as recently as this week, officials said they had not established with certainty who carried out the attack.
Kirby had said on Tuesday that Iraq is in charge of the investigation into the February 15 attack. He added that at the time, US officials were unable to “give any particular attribution to who was behind these attacks.”
A little-known Shia militant group calling itself Saraya Alwiya al-Dam, Arabic for Guardians of Blood Brigade, claimed responsibility for the February 15 attack. A week later, a missile strike in Baghdad’s green zone appeared to be aimed at the compound of the US embassy, but no one was injured.
Iran said this week it has no affiliation with the Guardians of Blood Brigade. Iranian-backed groups have fragmented significantly 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 played a key role in leading and controlling a wide variety of Iranian-backed groups operating in Iraq.
Since their death, the militias have become increasingly unmanageable. Some analysts argue that the armed groups have fragmented as a tactic to claim attacks under different names to mask their involvement.
US forces in Iraq have been significantly reduced to 2,500 personnel and are no longer participating in combat missions with Iraqi forces in ongoing operations against the Islamic State group.
Baldor and Burns reported from Washington, DC
Copyright © 2021 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved.