Syria: "Civilian and Military Deaths, Property Damage Caused by US Airstrikes"

AFP and Sputnik News reported on the 3rd (local time), citing a Syrian government announcement, that civilian and military casualties occurred due to the US military's retaliatory airstrikes in Syria.

The Syrian Ministry of Defense stated, "The US airstrikes in eastern Syria caused numerous civilian and military deaths, as well as damage to public and private property."

[Image source=Yonhap News]

However, the Ministry did not specify the scale of casualties or property damage caused by the US airstrikes, but the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a UK-based Syrian human rights organization, previously reported that at least 18 armed militants were killed in the US strikes.

The Syrian Ministry of Defense's statement continued, "The US airstrikes are unjustifiable acts," emphasizing that "they appear to be aimed at weakening the war capabilities of the Syrian army and allied forces fighting terrorism," and stressed that the US control over Syrian territory cannot continue.

Earlier, the US Central Command announced that at 4 p.m. (Eastern Time) the previous day, it conducted airstrikes against the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force and affiliated militias in Iraq and Syria.

The command explained that the airstrikes targeted more than 85 sites across seven locations, including operational command and control facilities, and storage sites for rockets, missiles, and drones.

This is interpreted as the US launching a full-scale retaliation for the drone attack on the US military base stationed in Jordan that killed three US soldiers.