THREATS AND STRIKES PUT REGION ON HIGH ALERT AS BLINKEN LANDS
▶ Washington says bombing of targets linked to Iran ‘start, not end’ of response
Iran warned the US against attacking two of its suspected spy ships in the Red Sea after Washington bombed Tehran-linked military targets in Iraq, Syria and Yemen at the weekend.
The region is on high alert as the US carries out retaliatory air strikes against Iran-backed militias following an attack that killed three American soldiers in Jordan last week.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived last night on his fifth visit to the region since the war started.
The Gazan city of Rafah– where about one million Palestinians are sheltering – was bombed yesterday, as Israel ignored EU pleas for it to be spared. Two children were among those killed as a nursery was bombed. Air strikes were also reported in Khan Younis, Deir Al Balah, and the Nuseirat refugee camp.
The US military said it launched 85 air strikes against targets at four locations in Syria and three in Iraq on Friday.
“What happened on Friday was the beginning, not the end, of our response, and there will be more steps – some seen, some perhaps unseen,” White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said yesterday. He refused to specify what other targets the US could hit, after Iran called the strikes a “strategic mistake”.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kaanani said: “The continuation of such adventures is a threat to regional and international peace and security.” Tehran followed up yesterday with a warning not to attack two of its ships, the Behshad and Saviz.
The two ships have long been stationed in the Red Sea and are suspected of being spy boats operated by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. They are believed to be helping Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis carry out their campaign of attacks against shipping in the waterway.
The group has shown no sign of stopping its attacks despite
The continuation of such adventures is a threat to regional and international peace and security NASSER KAANANI Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman
Iran has said US air strikes against its proxies in Syria and Iraq were a “strategic mistake” that threatens to increase tension and instability in the region.
The US launched 85 strikes against Tehran-backed armed groups at four locations in Syria and three locations in Iraq on Friday, in what President Joe Biden called the first wave of retaliation for a drone attack that killed three American troops in Jordan last Sunday.
Syrian and Iraqi officials said security personnel and civilians were killed in the strikes.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kaanani condemned the attacks as breaches of Syrian and Iraqi sovereignty, international law and the UN Charter, state news agency Irna reported.
“The continuation of such adventures is a threat to regional and international peace and security,” he said on Saturday.
The US attributed last week’s attack in Jordan to the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a network of Iran-backed militias that has mounted several attacks on US troops in Iraq and Syria since the Israel-Gaza war began.
The strikes in Syria were mostly aimed at “alleged arms depots said to be used by armed groups in Syria and Iraq”, a source in Beirut told
The National.
“Those included locations in Deir Ezzor: near the airport, the Harabesh neighbourhood in the east, and Deir Ayash area in the west.”
The US also hit “at least three locations in Mayadeen city near the border with Iraq”, the source said.
“The strikes were not a surprise. And the targets, the alleged arms depots, weren’t a surprise either. It was all well calculated, so it won’t lead to further escalation with Iran.”
The Syrian army said the strikes had killed several civilians and military personnel, without providing figures. They also caused “huge damage to private and public properties” and power cuts near the Syria-Iraq border, state news agency Sana reported.
Syria’s military said the strikes had “no justification” and demanded Washington withdraw its remaining troops from the country’s north, where they are stationed to help local forces fight the remnants of ISIS.
Basim Al Awadi, spokesman for Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al Sudani, said the US strikes had hit Al Qaim and Akashat on the border with Syria, killing 16 people, including civilians, and injuring 25.
“Furthermore, the assault resulted in significant losses and damage to residential buildings and citizens’ property,” Mr Al Awadi said.
He denied Washington’s assertion that Baghdad had been notified of the strikes in advance, calling it “an unfounded claim crafted to mislead international public opinion and evade legal responsibility”.
On Saturday, the US and Britain carried out air strikes against the Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen.
“The US-British aggression today at dawn launched three raids on Saada governorate,” Houthi-run news agency Saba reported.
This was the third round of joint US-British air strikes since January 11, when the two countries began a campaign to degrade the Houthis’ ability to carry out drone and missile attacks against commercial ships in the Red Sea.
The rebels say their attacks, which have disrupted global shipping since November, are directed at Israel-linked vessels and are a show of support for Palestinians amid the Israel-Gaza war.
The war, which began on October 7 when Hamas, the militant group that governs Gaza, killed about 1,200 people in an attack on southern Israel, has brought about an increase in violence across the region.
More than 27,200 people have been killed in Gaza during Israel’s offensive, the enclave’s Health Ministry says.
Along Israel’s northern border with Lebanon, the Iranbacked militia Hezbollah has exchanged near daily artillery fire with the Israeli army, while US troops in Iraq and Syria have faced increased attacks by groups linked to Tehran.
Israel has been accused of carrying out strikes that killed senior members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in the Syrian capital Damascus, as well as a strike in the Lebanese capital Beirut that killed the deputy leader of Hamas’s political wing.
Iran’s Tasnim news agency reported that an adviser from the IRGC was killed in an air strike in Damascus early on Friday.