Reconnaissance drone flew over Mission Support Site Conoco on Tuesday afternoon before American forces shot it down
Updated 15 February 2023
AP
BEIRUT: US forces shot down an Iranian-made drone flying over a base housing American troops in northeastern Syria, the US military said Wednesday.
The incident comes more than a week after a deadly 7.8 magnitude earthquake rocked Turkiye and Syria, followed by a significant de-escalation of violence across the war-torn country.
US Central Command said in a statement that the reconnaissance drone flew over Mission Support Site Conoco on Tuesday afternoon before American forces shot it down.
No group claimed responsibility for flying the drone in northeastern Syria, where it is not uncommon for bases housing US troops to come under rocket fire or mortar attacks. Iran-backed militia are based nearby, as are sleeper cells of the Daesh group that was defeated in Syria in March 2019.
There are roughly 900 US troops in Syria, including in the north and farther south and east, who work alongside Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces targeting Daesh militants and their sleeper cells.
January settler attacks cause record West Bank displacement since Oct 2023: UN
Updated 8 sec ago
RAMALLAH: Israeli settler violence and harassment in the occupied West Bank displaced nearly 700 Palestinians in January, the United Nations said Thursday, the highest rate since the Gaza war erupted in October 2023. At least 694 Palestinians were forcefully driven from their homes last month, according to figures from the UN’s humanitarian agency OCHA, which compiles data from various United Nations agencies. The UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR) said in late January that settler violence has become a key driver of forced displacement in the West Bank. January’s displacement numbers were particularly high in part due to the displacement of an entire herding community in the Jordan Valley, Ras Ein Al-Auja, whose 130 families left after months of harassment. “What is happening today is the complete collapse of the community as a result of the settlers’ continuous and repeated attacks, day and night, for the past two years,” Farhan Jahaleen, a Bedouin resident, told AFP at the time. Settlers in the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967, use herding to establish a presence on agricultural lands used by Palestinian communities and gradually deny them access to these areas, according to a 2025 report by Israeli NGO Peace Now. To force Palestinians out, settlers resort to harassment, intimidation and violence, “with the backing of the Israeli government and military,” the settlement watchdog said. “No one is putting the pressure on Israel or on the Israeli authorities to stop this and so the settlers feel it, they feel the complete impunity that they’re just free to continue to do this,” said Allegra Pacheco, director of the West Bank Protection Consortium, a group of NGOS working to support Palestinian communities against displacement. She pointed to a lack of attention on the West Bank as another driving factor. “All eyes are focused on Gaza when it comes to Palestine, while we have an ongoing ethnic cleansing in the West Bank and nobody’s paying attention,” she told AFP. West Bank Palestinians are also displaced when Israel’s military destroys structures and dwellings it says are built without permits. In January, 182 more Palestinians were displaced due to home demolitions, according to OCHA. Excluding Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem, the West Bank is home to more than 500,000 Israelis living in settlements and outposts considered illegal under international law. Around three million Palestinians live in the West Bank.
