Indirect clashes between major powers continue on the ground in Syria. Two days after the Russian bombardment of a wood held by the rebels near Idlib, it was the American army which struck, on Tuesday, the bases of pro-Iranian militias in the East. The strikes took place in Deir Ezzor province and targeted “infrastructure used by groups affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards”, said the spokesman for the US military’s central command in the Middle East, Colonel Joe Buccino, in a statement.
The Revolutionary Guard Corps, considered the Iranian regime’s ideological army, is on the US blacklist of “terrorist groups”. These “precision strikes” aim, according to Colonel Buccino, to “defend and protect American forces from attacks such as those carried out on August 15 by groups supported by Iran”. Several drones then attacked an advanced base of the anti-jihadist coalition, according to the Americans who had not deplored any casualties. The American aerial bombardment on Tuesday hit nine bunkers used in particular for the storage of ammunition, Colonel Bucino then told CNN.
Hundreds of American soldiers are deployed in northeastern Syria as part of the anti-jihadist coalition responsible for fighting, with their Kurdish allies from the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the remnants of the Islamic State group. Tuesday’s bombardment came the same day as Iranian state media reported the death on Sunday of a Revolutionary Guards general killed during a “mission” in Syria. No details were given on the circumstances of the death of the general, just described as a “defender of the sanctuary”, a term used to designate those who work on behalf of Iran in Syria or Iraq.