US says it carried out strike against ‘imminent threat’ in Syria

The onslaught comes arsenic unit successful Syria intensifies, with absorption fighters advancing against authorities positions.

Washington, DC – The Pentagon has confirmed that the United States carried retired a onslaught against subject assets successful eastbound Syria aft a rocket onslaught adjacent 1 of its bases.

Pentagon spokesperson Pat Ryder told reporters connected Tuesday that the US subject struck weapons systems — including rocket launchers and a vessel — that “presented a wide and imminent threat” to its forces successful the area.

The US onslaught comes arsenic unit escalates crossed the war-torn country. Over the past week, equipped absorption groups carried retired a blistering violative successful northwest Syria against the authorities forces led by President Bashar al-Assad, ushering successful a caller signifier of the country’s long-running civilian war.

The violative has raised questions astir however the US mightiness respond and whether it could go entangled successful the conflict, fixed its important subject beingness successful Syria.

Ryder said connected Tuesday that the onslaught was successful effect to a rocket motorboat that fell “in the vicinity” of Military Support Site (MSS) Euphrates, a US basal successful eastbound Syria.

He added that it is not wide who was operating the weapons, but Iran-backed groups and Syrian authorities forces are known to beryllium successful the area.

The Pentagon spokesperson stressed that the enactment is “not linked to immoderate broader activities successful northwest Syria by different groups”.

But connected Tuesday, Damascus accused the US of providing aerial enactment for the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which pushed to beforehand against government-controlled villages eastbound of the Euphrates River, adjacent the metropolis of Deir ez-Zor.

The SDF has received US enactment for years nether the stated purpose of warring ISIL (ISIS).

Syrian state-run Alikhbaria TV reported connected Tuesday that clashes were taking spot betwixt SDF and authorities forces adjacent the colony of Tabiyet Jazira “with the involution of US occupation jets that are targeting the frontlines successful the area”.

The SDF had claimed earlier successful the time that it took power of 7 villages eastbound of the Euphrates owed to the “serious menace related to the imminent question of ample ISIS violent cells”.

“The deployment of our forces to these villages is successful effect to the urgent pleas and appeals of the section populace, pursuing the expanding imaginable risks that ISIS volition exploit the events successful the westbound of the country,” the SDF’s Deir ez-Zor Military Council said successful a statement.

But the Syrian authorities said the villages stay nether its control.

Farther west, authorities troops person been battling rebels trying to beforehand towards the cardinal city of Hama arsenic the beforehand lines of the war, which had gone mostly dormant implicit the past 4 years, spot large shifts.

Rebel groups, led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which had been confined to the northwestern Idlib province, launched their violative past week, taking power of Aleppo and heading southbound towards Hama.

The state had experienced comparative calm since 2020 with the government, rebel groups and SDF mostly remaining wrong their unofficial territories.

But the absorption appears to person struck astatine an opportune infinitesimal erstwhile President al-Assad’s main subject backers — Russia, Iran and Lebanon’s Hezbollah — are focusing connected their own conflicts elsewhere.

The US, which calls Assad a “brutal dictator”, has denied immoderate engagement successful the rebels’ offensive, highlighting that Washington considers HTS to beryllium a “terrorist” group.

HTS is a reiteration of al-Nusra Front, which operated arsenic al-Qaeda’s subdivision successful Syria aboriginal successful the war.

According to the Pentagon, Washington has 900 troops successful Syria and a heavy confederation with the SDF, 1 of the large parties to the conflict.

On Tuesday, the Pentagon’s Ryder declined to reply questions astir the SDF’s operations successful the Deir ez-Zor area.

“Our absorption has been connected moving with the SDF arsenic it relates to countering ISIS, and that continues to beryllium our focus,” helium said.