In reaction to the drone strike which killed three US troops in Jordan on last Sunday, the US military unleashed a huge airstrike on dozens of Iranian-controlled locations in Iraq and Syria. President Joe Biden authorized the attacks, which targeted control and command headquarters, intelligence centers, rockets as well as missiles, drone and ammunition locations for storage, and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force as well as affiliated militia groups.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war tracker said that strikes in eastern Syria ended up killing a minimum of 18 pro-Iran fighters.
According to the monitoring group, a minimum of 26 important sites real estate pro-Iranian groups, including weapons depots, have been destroyed in ongoing raids across a large swath of eastern Syria, spanning more than sixty-two miles from Deir Ezzor to Albu Kamal near the Iraqi border.
Strikes followed by soldiers’ funeral
Biden, who had threatened to retaliate against those responsible for the drone assault in Jordan, had earlier Friday attended an official military ceremony at a Delaware air base to honour the three fallen soldiers.
Six troops dressed in camouflage, dark caps and white gloves marched cautiously three times on and down the ramp of a massive C-5 cargo plane, carrying the remains in flag-draped ‘transfer cases’ as the military refers to caskets used in transit to a waiting truck.
Biden, joined by First Lady Jill Biden, had a gloomy face and held his hand over his heart. Family members watched from a separate location, shielded from the press.
Mixed responses received from the Iran-backed militias
To avoid embarrassment for the Iraqi government, Kataeb Hezbollah, one of the principal Iran-backed militia, has declared a cessation of attacks on American forces. However, Harakat al-Nujaba, another key Iran-backed militia, has promised to resume military activities against US forces.
For years, Iran-backed militias have posed a threat to US sites, and their assaults have intensified during Israel’s battle with Hamas. The battle has killed hundreds of Palestinians and heightened tensions in the Middle East, with Iran-backed armed groups exploiting it to justify attacks on Israeli or US objectives.
What is the stand of Iran’s President?
Iran’s hard-line President Ebrahim Raisi echoed Tehran’s past pledges to potentially react for any US strikes against its interests on Friday morning. We, the Iranian people, “will not start a war, but if a country, if a cruel force wants to bully us, the Islamic Republic of Iran will give a strong response,” he stated.
Prime suspects of the United States for the attack in Jordan
The United States has blamed the fatal attack in Jordan on the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a wide coalition of Iran-backed militias, but has yet to identify a single organisation. Kataeb Hezbollah is, nevertheless, a prime suspect.
Some of the militias have posed a threat to US bases for years, but their attacks have risen in the aftermath of Israel’s battle with Hamas following the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, which killed 1,200 people and kidnapped 250 more. The war has killed over 27,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and inflamed the Middle East.
Iran-backed militia groups across the area have taken advantage of the crisis to justify attacking Israeli or US goals, including targeting civilian commercial ships and US warships in the Red Sea with drones or missiles on a regular basis.
Attacks carried out by Iraq-backed militia groups against US
According to a US military spokesman, Iran-backed militia groups had carried out 166 strikes against US military locations since October 18, including 67 in Iraq, 98 in Syria, and one in Jordan as of Tuesday. The most recent strike took place on January 29 at Iraq’s al-Asad airfield, with no injuries or damage reported.
Meanwhile, the United States has strengthened defences at the Jordanian facility stormed by the ran-backed militants on Sunday, claimed a senior US official.
