ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - An innominate drone strike killed five members of a pro-Iran militia in Syria’s eastern Deir ez-Zor province amid heightened tensions between regime and Kurdish-led forces, a war monitor reported on Sunday. “Five members of the pro-Iran militias were killed and others injured … after an unknown drone targeted a military vehicle that they were riding in between the villages of al-Kashma and al-Duwair in the eastern countryside of Deir ez-Zor,” said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based war monitor. Tensions are high in Deir ez-Zor, a province on the border with Iraq that is predominantly controlled by the Iran-backed pro-Syrian regime militias and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) - on opposite sides of the Euphrates River. It is not clear who was behind the strike. Militias affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) maintain a heavy influence in the area and are frequently targeted by Israeli and US air and drone strikes. Pro-Damascus groups have recently escalated their attacks against SDF positions in the province, which is also home to many of the country’s key oilfields, such as Omar and Conoco, which the US-led global coalition helps the SDF to control. On Saturday, the Syrian government reiterated its demand for Washington to withdraw from the country amid ongoing clashes between pro-regime and SDF forces in Deir ez-Zor. Labeling the SDF as a “cheap tool” for the United States, Damascus said that the presence of US forces in parts of Syria is a “flagrant violation of Syria’s sovereignty and the unity and integrity of its territories.” There is a history of tense relations between the Kurdish-led SDF and some Arab tribes in the province. Some anti-SDF groups have claimed that the Kurdish-led multiethnic force is targeting Arabs, an allegation vehemently rejected by the SDF. On Wednesday, pro-regime National Defense Forces launched an overnight attack in Deir ez-Zor killing at least two civilians, according to the SDF. The Syrian Democratic Council (SDC), the SDF’s political wing, blamed Damascus. On Friday, at least 11 civilians were killed in a barrage of rockets and artillery shells that targeted Deir ez-Zor’s Dahalah village, according to the SDF, who again blamed pro-regime forces for the attack. The Syrian foreign ministry said the strike was carried out by US warplanes, with the support of the SDF. Around 2,500 US forces in Iraq and 900 in Syria are leading an international coalition to defeat the Islamic State (ISIS) through Operation Inherent Resolve. The have assisted Kurdish, Iraqi, and local Syrian forces in the fight against ISIS; however, the US-led coalition lacks a mandate from Damascus to be in Syria, and it cites the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy to condone its presence in the war-torn country.
