White House: Biden committed to keeping US occupation troops in Syria
The White House has said that US President Joe Biden is committed to keeping American occupation troops in Syria in the wake of multiple air strikes in the eastern parts of the Arab country.
US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said on Sunday, “We’re going to always act to defend our troops and our facilities.”
Kirby added that Biden is “absolutely” committed to keeping American troops in Syria, where they are occupying the territory against international law, violating the country’s sovereignty.
“Here’s what’s not gonna change … the mission in ISIS is not gonna change,” Kirby said. “We have under 1,000 troops in Syria that are going after that network which is, while greatly diminished, still viable and still critical.”
Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin said the strikes in Syria against the positions of resistance fighters were carried out at the direction of Biden and targeted facilities used by groups affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps.
However, local sources pointed out that the target was not an Iran-aligned military post as the US military claimed, but rather a rural development center and a grain center in Hrabash neighborhood, near Dayr al-Zawr military airport. No Iranian was killed in the act of aggression.
A military source in Syria told Press TV that the resistance groups reserve their right to respond to the American attack and will take reciprocal action.
On Friday, after the Pentagon carried out multiple airstrikes against Syrian troops, a military base housing US forces in the eastern province of Dayr al-Zawr came under a rocket attack.
Local sources reported that the rockets landed in the vicinity of the US-controlled al-Omar oil field at around 11 a.m. local time (0800 GMT), causing several explosions.
On Saturday, Iran’s Arabic-language al-Alam television news network reported that more than 20 rockets had been fired against two illegal bases belonging to American occupation forces in eastern Syria.
Kirby on Sunday said Biden acted “swiftly and boldly,” saying additional US action has not been ruled out.
“I’m certainly not going to rule out the potential for additional US action if the president deems it appropriate and necessary to continue to protect our troops and our facilities,” Kirby said. “We’re going to keep at that and that message is sent loud and clear.”
“And we demonstrated here this week, that the United States will always act decisively to protect our people,” he added.
Syria condemned in the strongest terms the United States military for carrying out the air strikes, saying the raids are a cover-up for Washington’s ferocious attempts to further plunder energy resources there.
Syrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates made the remarks in a statement on Saturday, after the US conducted airstrikes in Syria on Thursday, blaming Damascus for a drone attack that purportedly killed an American contractor, wounded another, and also hurt five US troops.
The statement denounced the brutal attack launched by the US forces against some areas in Dayr al-Zawr province, which claimed the lives of a number of people, left several others injured, and caused property damage in the targeted regions.
The US military has for long stationed its forces and equipment in northeastern Syria, with the Pentagon claiming that the deployment is aimed at preventing the oilfields in the area from falling into the hands of the Daesh terrorists.
Damascus, however, maintains the deployment is meant to plunder the country’s natural resources. Former US president Donald Trump admitted on several occasions that American forces were in the Arab country for its oil wealth.
