ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - At least 15 pro-Iran fighters were killed in a strike on a convoy carrying fuel along the Iraqi-Syrian border on Tuesday evening, according to a war monitor.
UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that the attack hit pro-Iran militia positions in Syria’s Deir ez-Zor, along the Iraq border. The strike targeted a convoy of “fuel tankers and trucks loaded with weapons.”
The attack struck a convoy of around 15 fuel trucks crossing from Iraq into Syria, Associated Press said, citing two officials from Iran-backed paramilitary groups operating in the area.
It is not immediately clear who carried out the attack, while the number of casualties and their nationalities are still not confirmed.
Telegram channels affiliated to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) claimed that the attack targeted oil tankers traveling from Iran to Lebanon. Iranian state media later confirmed that 22 tankers were on their way to Lebanon when eight of them came under attack by what they claim was a US drone, resulting in the burning of two tankers. A US coalition spokesperson denied that the US was involved in the strike.
"This was not a U.S. strike," Joe Buccino, the spokesperson for the US Central Command (CENTCOM) told Rudaw via email.
The strike comes a day after a US citizen, Stephen Edward Troell, was killed in Baghdad. No group claimed responsibility for the killing but Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani on Monday ordered a probe into the incident. The US embassy in Baghdad confirmed Troell’s death, adding that they were closely monitoring the investigation.
Attacks targeting foreign nationals in the Iraqi capital have become a rare occurrence given the deployment of security across the city.
Tit-for-tat attacks between the US and Iran playing out in Iraq and Syria have simmered down over the past year. In August, US forces launched airstrikes targeting facilities used by Iranian-backed militias in Deir ez-Zor in an attack it said was in retaliation to an attack on a US base.
Israel has carried out hundreds of airstrikes on regime-controlled areas of Syria, as well as Deir ez-Zor, throughout its 11-year civil war, often claiming to target Iran-affiliated militias, such as Lebanon's Hezbollah group which supports the Syrian army.
Israel rarely comments on airstrikes attributed to it in Syria but it has repeatedly warned that it would not tolerate an increase in Iranian presence.
Updated at 7:30PM with Buccino's comments
