BEIJING, Feb. 3 (Xinhua) -- The United States carried out on Friday strikes on Iran-linked militia targets in Syria and Iraq in retaliation for a deadly attack on a U.S. military base in Jordan, a move that could heighten tension in the Middle East.
The airstrikes, which lasted 30 minutes, were aimed at 85 targets across seven locations in Syria and Iraq, said the White House.
At least 13 pro-Iran fighters were killed in U.S. airstrikes that targeted strongholds of pro-Iran fighters in the eastern Syrian province of Deir al-Zour, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The airstrikes destroyed 17 sites in Deir al-Zour in three rounds of airstrikes on the city of al-Mayadeen and one round on al-Bukamal, a city near the Syrian-Iraqi border.
Local media also confirmed the death and injury of several "martyrs" at different attacked sites in Syria.
Top Iranian advisors reportedly withdrew to Damascus, while some elements of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) remained in Deir al-Zour, with the Lebanese Hezbollah and the Fatimiyoun Brigade, both supported by the IRGC, tasked with managing the operations in Deir al-Zour.
Two hours before the U.S. attacks, the Observatory said, Israeli and Western electronic intelligence and aerial surveillance planes were conducting intensive reconnaissance deep into Syrian territory.
U.S. reconnaissance planes continued to patrol the region's airspace intensively after the air strikes, it added.
On Sunday, three U.S. soldiers were killed in a drone strike on an American base in Jordan. Pro-Iran militias, which have stepped up their drone attacks on U.S. bases in Syria and Iraq in tandem with the Israeli military campaign on Gaza, were blamed for the attack.
The attack, which also injured more than 40 U.S. service members, was "planned, resourced and facilitated" by the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella group containing "multiple groups including Kataib Hezbollah," said the White House on Wednesday.
Also on Friday, the Iraqi government said that the border areas in western Iraq are under U.S. airstrikes, warning such attacks will have serious consequences for the security and stability of Iraq and the region.
The U.S. airstrikes targeted the town of al-Qaim, some 400 km west of Baghdad, and other border areas in Iraq.
"These air strikes violate Iraq's sovereignty and come at a time when Iraq is striving to ensure stability in the region," Yahya Rasoul, the military spokesperson of the Iraqi prime minister, said in a statement.
He described the air strikes as "a threat that will drag Iraq and the region into undesirable consequences that will be dire for security and stability in Iraq and the region."
At least three Iraqis were killed and five others were injured by the airstrikes on some sites belonging to the Iraqi paramilitary Hashd Shaabi forces, a security source in Anbar province, who requested to remain anonymous, told Xinhua.
The Biden administration has suggested that the U.S. response to the drone attack would be prolonged.
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement that the strikes are "the start of our response."
Iran has previously warned the United States against launching any direct strike on Iranian territory, saying if the United States acts in this way its response will be swift and dramatic. ■
