{"id":93166,"date":"2021-02-26T07:28:27","date_gmt":"2021-02-26T12:28:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/?p=93166"},"modified":"2021-02-26T07:28:27","modified_gmt":"2021-02-26T12:28:27","slug":"auto-draft-516","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/2021\/02\/26\/auto-draft-516\/","title":{"rendered":"US Carries Out Airstrike Against Iranian-backed Militia Target in Syria, Officials Say"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"article__lightbox-available\" data-pswp-uid=\"1\">\n<div class=\"article__content\">\n<div class=\"article__body\">\n<div>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-93167 alignleft\" src=\"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/John-Kirby-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/John-Kirby-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/John-Kirby-150x100.jpg 150w, https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/John-Kirby.jpg 600w, https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/John-Kirby-24x16.jpg 24w, https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/John-Kirby-36x24.jpg 36w, https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/John-Kirby-48x32.jpg 48w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/>VOA \u2014 WASHINGTON &#8211; U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday directed U.S. military airstrikes in eastern Syria against facilities belonging to what the Pentagon said were Iran-backed militia, in a calibrated response to recent rocket attacks against U.S. targets in Iraq.<\/p>\n<p>The strikes appeared to be limited in scope, potentially lowering the risk of escalation.<\/p>\n<p>Biden&#8217;s decision to strike only in Syria and not in Iraq, at least for now, also gives the Iraqi government some breathing room as it carries out its own investigation of a Feb. 15 attack that wounded Americans.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;At President (Joe) Biden\u2019s direction, U.S. military forces earlier this evening conducted airstrikes against infrastructure utilized by Iranian-backed militant groups in eastern Syria,&#8221; Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said in a statement.<\/p>\n<div class=\"twitter-tweet twitter-tweet-rendered\"><iframe id=\"twitter-widget-0\" class=\"\" title=\"Twitter Tweet\" src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/embed\/Tweet.html?dnt=false&amp;embedId=twitter-widget-0&amp;frame=false&amp;hideCard=false&amp;hideThread=false&amp;id=1365087570418413569&amp;lang=en&amp;origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.voanews.com%2Fmiddle-east%2Fus-carries-out-airstrike-against-iranian-backed-militia-target-syria-officials-say&amp;siteScreenName=VOANews&amp;theme=light&amp;widgetsVersion=889aa01%3A1612811843556&amp;width=550px\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" data-tweet-id=\"1365087570418413569\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>&#8220;President Biden will act to protect American and coalition personnel. At the same time, we have acted in a deliberate manner that aims to de-escalate the overall situation in both eastern Syria and Iraq,&#8221; Kirby said.<\/p>\n<p>He added that the strikes destroyed multiple facilities at a border control point used by a number of Iranian-backed militant groups, including Kata&#8217;ib Hezbollah (KH) and Kata&#8217;ib Sayyid al-Shuhada (KSS).<\/p>\n<p>A U.S. official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the decision to carry out these strikes was meant to send a signal that while the United States wanted to punish the militias, it did not want the situation to spiral into a bigger conflict.<\/p>\n<p>It was not immediately clear what damage was caused and if there were any casualties from the U.S. strike.<\/p>\n<p>Retaliatory U.S. military strikes have occurred a number of times in the past few years.<\/p>\n<div class=\"embedded-entity\" data-embed-button=\"wysiwug_image\" data-entity-embed-display=\"view_mode:media.large_embedded\" data-entity-type=\"media\" data-entity-uuid=\"2773aa75-f799-4f63-be59-685b383c756f\" data-langcode=\"en\">\n<figure class=\"media media--type-image media--view-mode-\">\n<div><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/im-media.voltron.voanews.com\/Drupal\/01live-166\/styles\/sourced_737px_wide\/s3\/2021-02\/Damascus-Syria-1080x1080.png?itok=SmnrOdtD\" alt=\"Map of Damascus Syria, also showing the Golan Heights\" width=\"737\" height=\"737\" \/><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>The rocket attacks on U.S. positions in Iraq were carried out as Washington and Tehran are looking for a way to return to the 2015 nuclear deal abandoned by former U.S. President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n<p>It was not clear how, or whether, the strike might affect U.S. efforts to coax Iran back into a negotiation about both sides resuming compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal.<\/p>\n<p>In the Feb.\u00a015 attack, rockets hit the U.S. military base housed at Erbil International Airport in the Kurdish-run region killing one non-American contractor and injuring a number of American contractors and a U.S. service member. Another salvo struck a base hosting U.S. forces north of Baghdad days later hurting at least one contractor.<\/p>\n<p>On Monday, rockets hit Baghdad\u2019s Green Zone, which houses the U.S. Embassy and other diplomatic missions.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this week, the Kata&#8217;ib Hezbollah, one of the main Iran-aligned Iraqi militia groups, denied any role in recent rocket attacks against U.S. targets in Iraq.<\/p>\n<p>Some Western and Iraqi officials say the attacks, often claimed by little-known groups, are being carried out by militants with links to Kata&#8217;ib Hezbollah as a way for Iranian allies to harass U.S. forces without being held accountable.<\/p>\n<p>Since late 2019, the United States carried out high-profile strikes against the Kata\u2019ib Hezbollah militia group in Iraq and Syria in response to sometimes deadly rocket attacks against U.S.-led forces.<\/p>\n<p>Under the Trump administration, the back-and-forth stoked tensions, culminating in the U.S. killing of Iranian military leader Qassem Soleimani and a retaliatory Iranian ballistic missile attack against U.S. forces in Iraq last year.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"article__footer\">\n<h2 class=\"section-title\">\u00a0<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>VOA \u2014 WASHINGTON &#8211; U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday directed U.S. military airstrikes in eastern Syria against facilities belonging to what the Pentagon said were Iran-backed militia, in a calibrated response to recent rocket attacks against U.S. targets in Iraq. The strikes appeared to be limited in scope, potentially lowering the risk of escalation. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":93167,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-93166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latests"],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.2","language":"en","enabled_languages":["fa","en"],"languages":{"fa":{"title":true,"content":false,"excerpt":false},"en":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93166"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93166\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":93169,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93166\/revisions\/93169"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93167"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}