The US military has launched airstrikes on two locations in eastern Syria linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the Pentagon has said, amid growing fears that the war between Israel and Hamas could escalate into a regional conflict.
The strikes hit a weapons storage facility and an ammunition storage facility used by the IRGC and militia it backs, senior US officials told Reuters, saying it was unclear if Iranian nationals were killed.
The strikes took place at about 4.30am on Friday near Abu Kamal, a Syrian town on the border with Iraq, and were carried out by two F-16 fighter jets using precision munitions, one of the officials said.
In a statement, defence secretary Lloyd Austin said the “self-defence strikes” early on Friday were a response to a slew of drone and missile attacks by Iranian-backed militia groups against US bases and personnel in Syria and Iraq that began last week.
He said President Joe Biden had directed the tailored strikes “to make clear that the United States will not tolerate such attacks and will defend itself, its personnel, and its interests”.
According to the Pentagon, there have now been at least 19 attacks on US bases and personnel in Iraq and Syria since 17 October, including three new ones on Thursday. Air force Brig Gen Pat Ryder said 21 US personnel were injured in two of the assaults that used drones to target al-Asad airbase in Iraq and al-Tanf garrison in Syria.
Officials at the Pentagon and the White House have made it clear for the past week that the US would respond, with Ryder saying again on Thursday that it would be “at the time and place of our choosing”.
“I think we’ve been crystal clear that we maintain the inherent right of defending our troops and we will take all necessary measures to protect our forces and our interests overseas,” he told a Pentagon briefing earlier in the day.
US officials said they did not coordinate the strikes with Israel, and Austin said in his statement that the operation was separate and distinct from Israel’s war against Hamas. Austin added: “We continue to urge all state and non-state entities not to take action that would escalate into a broader regional conflict.”
The attacks on the US have been claimed by groups either directly controlled by Tehran or sharing the ideology of other groups currently fighting Israel. On Thursday, a US base at Kharab al-Jir in Syria was attacked for the second time in two days, and a base in western Iraq was also hit.
Iranian foreign minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said at the UN on Thursday that if Israel’s offensive against Hamas did not stop, the US would “not be spared from this fire”.
Governments in the west and the Middle East are concerned about a wider regional conflict developing if Israel continues its bombardment of Gaza or mounts a ground invasion in response to the 7 October attack by Hamas.
The US is in a delicate situation. It wants to hit Iranian-backed groups suspected of targeting the US as strongly as possible to deter future aggression while also trying to avoid inflaming the region and provoking a wider conflict.
Biden has already ordered two aircraft carriers to the eastern Mediterranean as a deterrent and US officials have reportedly asked Israel to hold off on a ground invasion of Gaza until new anti-missile units meant to protect US forces have reached their destinations.
Earlier on Thursday Biden also sent a rare message to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warning Tehran against targeting US personnel in the Middle East, the White House said.
On Thursday, Israel said it was entering the “next stages of the war” after a substantial but limited raid on Gaza, in what was described as a probing action in preparation for a more sustained ground offensive.
Israel said on Friday that its fighter jets had struck three senior Hamas operatives in the Daraj Tuffah Battalion, part of the Gaza City Brigade, Reuters reported. Israel said the three commanders had played a significant role in the 7 October attack on Israel. There was no official announcement by Hamas.
Palestinian militants also clashed with Israeli troops in at least two areas of the Gaza Strip on Friday, Hamas-affiliated media reported. Israeli military vehicles raided the central area of Al-Bureij and troops were clashing with militants near the border there, the reports said.
In the south, in a border area near the town of Rafah, Hamas militants were trading fire with Israeli troops, according to the reports.
The Guardian was not able to verify these reports.
Israel has imposed a siege on the densely populated Gaza Strip after the 7 October Hamas attack on Israeli communities and launched intense airstrikes. Israel says Hamas killed 1,400 people including children, and took more than 200 hostages, some of them infants and older adults.
The Hamas-controlled Gaza health ministry said on Thursday that 7,028 Palestinians had been killed in the retaliatory airstrikes, including 2,913 children.
Satellite images released on Thursday by Maxar Technologies and Planet Labs show buildings in wide areas of the coastal enclave reduced to rubble and grey ash spread over the land.
The UN has said that 42% of all housing units have been rendered uninhabitable in the past three weeks, with thousands more subject to moderate damage.
As the plight of the Palestinians grows more desperate, leaders of the 27 EU member states unanimously called for “humanitarian corridors and pauses” of the shelling in Gaza to allow in food, water and medical supplies.
The deal followed days of bickering over the language – including over whether to call for a ceasefire – in what one diplomat said was a week of “difficult discussions” over a situation everyone agreed was “horrific”.
The issue of whether to have humanitarian pauses or ceasefire agreements in the Hamas-run coastal enclave will also come before the 193-member UN general assembly on Friday in a draft resolution submitted by Arab states calling for a ceasefire.
Unlike in the security council where resolutions on Gaza aid failed this week, no country holds a veto in the general assembly. Resolutions are non-binding, but carry political weight.
“To say that the humanitarian situation in Gaza is catastrophic is an understatement. Everything that is needed to sustain life is missing or dwindling by the hour in Gaza,” said Mamadou Sow, head of the International Committee of the Red Cross’ regional delegation.
Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report