{"id":2929,"date":"2023-10-19T17:29:00","date_gmt":"2023-10-19T21:29:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/world\/us-troops-attacked-in-iraq-syria-and-on-alert-for-more-strikes\/19\/10\/2023\/"},"modified":"2023-10-19T17:29:00","modified_gmt":"2023-10-19T21:29:00","slug":"us-troops-attacked-in-iraq-syria-and-on-alert-for-more-strikes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/world\/us-troops-attacked-in-iraq-syria-and-on-alert-for-more-strikes\/19\/10\/2023\/","title":{"rendered":"US troops attacked in Iraq, Syria and on alert for more strikes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>By Idrees Ali<\/p>\n<p>WASHINGTON, Oct 19 (Reuters) &#8211; U.S. troops have been repeatedly attacked in Iraq and Syria in recent days, U.S. officials said on Thursday, as Washington is on heightened alert for activity by Iran-backed groups with regional tensions soaring during the Israel-Hamas war.<\/p>\n<p>President Joe Biden has sent naval power to the Middle East in the past two weeks, including two aircraft carriers, other warships and about 2,000 Marines.<\/p>\n<p>There has been an uptick in attacks on U.S. forces since the conflict in Israel broke out on Oct. 7 when Palestinian militants from Hamas attacked southern Israel. On Wednesday, a drone hit U.S. forces in Syria resulting in minor injuries, while another one was brought down.<\/p>\n<p>During a false alarm at Al Asad airbase in Iraq, a civilian contractor died from a cardiac arrest.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this week, U.S. forces thwarted multiple drones targeting troops in Iraq. On Thursday, drones and rockets targeted the Ain al-Asad air base, which hosts U.S. and other international forces in western Iraq, and multiple blasts were heard inside the base.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;While I&#8217;m not going to forecast any potential responses to these attacks, I will say that we will take all necessary actions to defend U.S. and coalition forces against any threat,&#8221; Pentagon spokesman Brigadier General Patrick Ryder told reporters on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Any response, should one occur, will come at a time in a manner of our choosing,&#8221; Ryder said.<\/p>\n<p>A U.S. Navy warship traveling near Yemen on Thursday intercepted missiles and several drones that were launched by what Ryder said was the Iran-aligned Houthi movement, though it appeared that the projectiles were potentially heading in the direction of Israel.<\/p>\n<p>LINK TO ISRAEL-HAMAS CONFLICT?<\/p>\n<p>Israel has called up a record 360,000 reservists and has been bombarding the Palestinian enclave of the Gaza Strip nonstop following Hamas&#8217;s Oct. 7 assault, which killed about 1,400 people, mostly civilians.<\/p>\n<p><button class=\"link caas-button collapse-button\" data-ylk=\"elm:readmore;slk:Story continues\">Story continues<\/button><\/p>\n<p>At least 3,785 Palestinians have been killed and 12,493 wounded in Israeli strikes on Gaza, the health ministry in Gaza said.<\/p>\n<p>But Ryder said he did not see a link between the rise in attacks and the conflict between Israel and Hamas.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;At this point, again, the information that we have does not show a direct connection to the Hamas attacks on October 7,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>The United States has 2,500 troops in Iraq, and 900 more in neighboring Syria, on a mission to advise and assist local forces in combating Islamic State, which in 2014 seized swathes of territory in both countries.<\/p>\n<p>In Iraq, tension over the war in Gaza had already been high. Its top Shi&#8217;ite Muslim cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, last week condemned Israel and called on the world to stand up to the &#8220;terrible brutality&#8221; in besieged Gaza.<\/p>\n<p>Kataib Hezbollah, a powerful armed faction with close ties to Iran, accused the United States of supporting Israel in &#8220;killing innocent people&#8221; and said it should leave Iraq.<\/p>\n<p>In past years, Iranian-backed militias in Iraq regularly targeted U.S. forces in Iraq and the U.S. embassy in Baghdad with rockets. Such attacks had abated under a truce in place since last year, and Iraq has had a period of relative calm. (Reporting by Idrees Ali; editing by Grant McCool)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/finance.yahoo.com\/news\/us-troops-attacked-iraq-syria-210439722.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Idrees Ali WASHINGTON, Oct 19 (Reuters) &ndash; U.S. troops have been repeatedly attacked in Iraq and Syria in recent days, U.S.<br \/><button class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/world\/us-troops-attacked-in-iraq-syria-and-on-alert-for-more-strikes\/19\/10\/2023\/\">Read More &rsaquo;<\/a><\/button><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11780,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2929"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2929"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2929\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2929"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2929"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2929"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}