Washington has repeatedly targeted sites used by Iran and its proxy forces in Iraq and Syria in response to dozens of attacks on American and allied forces in the region since the October 7 outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war.
"US military forces conducted necessary and proportionate strikes on three facilities used by Kataeb Hezbollah and affiliated groups in Iraq," Austin said in a statement.
"These precision strikes are a response to a series of attacks against US personnel in Iraq and Syria by Iranian-sponsored militias, including an attack by Iran-affiliated Kataeb Hezbollah and affiliated groups on Arbil Air Base earlier today," he said.
That attack wounded three US military personnel, one critically, US National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a statement.
President Joe Biden was briefed on the attack -- which was carried out with a one-way attack drone -- and directed the strikes in a call with Austin and other national security officials after ordering the Defense Department to prepare a response, the statement said.
- More than 100 attacks -
Biden "places no higher priority than the protection of American personnel serving in harm's way. The United States will act at a time and in a manner of our choosing should these attacks continue," the statement added.
The drone attack was claimed by the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a loose formation of armed groups affiliated with the Hashed al-Shaabi coalition of former paramilitaries that are now integrated into Iraq's regular armed forces.
A tally by US military officials has counted 103 attacks against its troops in Iraq and Syria since October 17, most of which have been claimed by the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, which opposes US support for Israel in its war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
The latest round of the Israel-Hamas conflict began when the Palestinian militant group carried out a shock cross-border attack from Gaza on October 7 that killed about 1,140 people, mostly civilians according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.
Following the attack, the United States rushed military aid to Israel, which has carried out a relentless campaign in Gaza that has killed at least 20,670 people, also mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory's health ministry.
Those deaths have sparked widespread anger in the Middle East and provided an impetus for attacks on American troops by forces opposed to their presence in the region.
There are roughly 2,500 American troops in Iraq and some 900 in Syria as part of efforts to prevent a resurgence of the Islamic State group.
The militants once held significant territory in both countries but were pushed back by local ground forces supported by international air strikes in a bloody, multi-year conflict.
Iran Guards say Israeli strike kills senior general in Syria
Tehran (AFP) Dec 25, 2023 -
A senior general with Iran's Revolutionary Guards was killed Monday by an Israeli air strike in Syria, the military force and Iranian state media said.
There was no immediate comment from Israel, which has repeatedly said it will not allow arch-enemy Iran to expand its presence in Syria.
Razi Moussavi "was killed during an attack by the Zionist regime a few hours ago in Zeinabiyah district in the suburbs of Damascus," Tehran's official IRNA news agency reported, using a different name for Sayyida Zeinab south of the Syrian capital.
IRNA said Moussavi was "one of the most experienced advisors" of Quds Force, the foreign arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
The general was "active in the field of providing logistical support to the axis of resistance in Syria," IRNA added, referring to groups backed by Tehran and arrayed against Israel.
The IRGC confirmed Moussavi's death in a statement, saying he was killed in a "missile attack".
The statement added that Moussavi was a companion of General Qassem Soleimani, Iran's revered Quds commander who was killed in Baghdad in a US drone strike in 2020.
Next week Iran will mark the fourth anniversary of Soleimani's assassination.
A Britain-based monitor, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, reported Israeli strikes Monday on positions used by Iranian groups and by Lebanon's powerful Tehran-aligned Hezbollah in the Sayyida Zeinab area.
Residents of the area reported hearing loud explosions and seeing columns of smoke rising from farms there.
Israel has launched hundreds of air strikes on its northern neighbour since Syria's civil war began in 2011, primarily targeting Iran-backed forces and Hezbollah fighters as well as Syrian army positions.
Israel, which rarely comments on reported strikes in Syria, has intensified attacks there particularly against Hezbollah since the start of its war against Hamas -- also backed by Iran -- triggered by the Palestinian militant group's deadly October 7 attacks.
The Islamic republic, which supports Hamas financially and militarily, has hailed the attacks as a "success" but denied any direct involvement.
According to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures, about 1,140 people, mostly civilians, were killed in Israel on October 7.
Israel's relentless retaliatory military campaign in Gaza has killed more than 20,400 people, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run coastal territory.
Iran does not recognise Israel and has made support for the Palestinian cause a centrepiece of its foreign policy since the 1979 Islamic revolution.
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