BEIRUT: Two rockets were fired Wednesday at an army base in eastern Syria hosting a US-led anti-extremist coalition, causing no casualties or damage, the US military said.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor, accused pro-Iranian groups of the attack a day after Iranians marked the third anniversary of the killing of a top general in a US drone strike.
At a commemoration in Tehran on Tuesday, Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi vowed “revenge” for the assassination of Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force, the foreign operations arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The US military’s Central Command (CENTCOM), in a statement that avoided accusing any perpetrators, said “two rockets targeted coalition forces at Mission Support Site Conoco” in the eastern Deir Ezzor province “today at approximately 9 am (0600 GMT).”
“The attack resulted in no injuries or damage to the base or coalition property,” it added.
Members of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the US-backed outfit that defeated Daesh in Syria, “visited the rocket origin site and found a third unfired rocket,” CENTCOM said.
Hundreds of American troops remain in Syria as part of an international coalition fighting Daesh remnants.
CENTCOM spokesman Joe Buccino said “attacks of this kind place coalition forces and the civilian population at risk and undermine the hard-earned stability and security of Syria and the region.”
Syrian bases hosting the US-led coalition have come under sporadic rocket fire blamed on pro-Iranian militias and Daesh.
Two such attacks in November, targeting a US patrol base in the northeastern Hasakah province and the coalition’s Green Village base near the Iraqi border, caused no casualties or damage, CENTCOM said.
The Syrian Observatory, which relies on a vast network of sources in the war-torn country, said Daesh was behind a November 26 attack that targeted the base in Hasakah province’s Al-Shaddadi.
The November 17 rocket fire that targeted the Green Village base in Al-Omar originated “from a base of pro-Iranian militias,” according to the Syrian Observatory.
Two rockets target US army base in eastern Syria: CENTCOM
https://arab.news/62xk2
Two rockets target US army base in eastern Syria: CENTCOM
- The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights accused pro-Iranian groups of the attack
- Syrian bases hosting US-led coalition have come under sporadic rocket fire blamed on pro-Iranian militias and Daesh
Syria’s leader set to visit Berlin with deportations in focus
- Sharaa is scheduled to meet his counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the German president’s office said
BERLIN: Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa is expected in Berlin on Tuesday for talks, as German officials seek to step up deportations of Syrians, despite unease about continued instability in their homeland.
Sharaa is scheduled to meet his counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the German president’s office said.
Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s office has yet to announce whether he would also hold talks with Sharaa during the visit.
Since ousting Syria’s longtime leader Bashar Assad in late 2024, Sharaa has made frequent overseas trips as the former Islamist rebel chief undergoes a rapid reinvention.
He has made official visits to the United States and France, and a series of international sanctions on Syria have been lifted.
The focus of next week’s visit for the German government will be on stepping up repatriations of Syrians, a priority for Merz’s conservative-led coalition since Assad was toppled.
Roughly one million Syrians fled to Germany in recent years, many of them arriving in 2015-16 to escape the civil war.
In November Merz, who fears being outflanked by the far-right AfD party on immigration, insisted there was “no longer any reason” for Syrians who fled the war to seek asylum in Germany.
“For those who refuse to return to their country, we can of course expel them,” he said.
- ‘Dramatic situation’ -
In December, Germany carried out its first deportation of a Syrian since the civil war erupted in 2011, flying a man convicted of crimes to Damascus.
But rights groups have criticized such efforts, citing continued instability in Syria and evidence of rights abuses.
Violence between the government and minority groups has repeatedly flared in multi-confessional Syria since Sharaa came to power, including recent clashes between the army and Kurdish forces.
Several NGOs, including those representing the Kurdish and Alawite Syrian communities in Germany, have urged Berlin to axe Sharaa’s planned visit, labelling it “totally unacceptable.”
“The situation in Syria is dramatic. Civilians are being persecuted solely on the basis of their ethnic or religious affiliation,” they said in a joint statement.
“It is incomprehensible to us and legally and morally unacceptable that the German government knowingly intends to receive a person suspected of being responsible for these acts at the chancellery.”
The Kurdish Community of Germany, among the signatories of that statement, also filed a complaint with German prosecutors in November, accusing Sharaa of war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity.
There have also been voices urging caution within government.
On a trip to Damascus in October, Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said that the potential for Syrians to return was “very limited” since the war had destroyed much of the country’s infrastructure.
But his comments triggered a backlash from his own conservative Christian Democratic Union party.
