Syrian military says US raid killed civilians, soldiers, caused “significant damage”

“[The United States] launched a blatant air aggression against a number of sites and towns in the eastern region of Syria, and near the Syrian-Iraqi border, which led to the martyrdom of a number of civilians and soldiers, the injury of others, and the infliction of significant damage to public and private property,” the Syrian Ministry of Defense said in a statement early Saturday.

Syria’s state-run news agency SANA reported the airstrikes hit the areas of Deir Ezzor, Al-Bukamal, and Al-Mayadeen as well as their surroundings on the Syrian-Iraqi border.

The Syrian foreign ministry has also warned that the US strikes that targeted various locations in Iraq and Syria late on Friday “fuel the conflict in the Middle East in a very dangerous way.”

“[Syria] condemns this blatant American violation [and] it categorically rejects all the pretexts and lies promoted by the American administration to justify this attack,” it announced in a statement on Saturday.

The US announced it conducted major airstrikes on 85 targets across seven locations in Iraq and Syria on Friday in response to a drone strike by militants on a US military outpost in Jordan on Sunday, which killed three US service members and wounded more than 40 others.

Earlier on Friday, Lt. Gen. Douglas Sims, the director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, stated there will “likely be casualties” from the strikes in Syria and Iraq.

In a statement issued on Friday, President Joe Biden said he personally ordered the Pentagon’s response to last weekend’s deadly drone strike on a Jordanian military base housing US troops.

“Our response began today,” Biden stated, adding that retaliatory strikes would continue “at times and places of our choosing.”

US defense chief Lloyd Austin has also warned that the latest round of strikes is just “the start of our response”, adding that “the president has directed additional actions”.