التصنيف: أخبار

The US has launched airstrikes on Iraq and Syria targeting Iranian-backed militias.

The move comes in retaliation for a drone attack on an American base in Jordan that resulted in the deaths of three US service members.

It is the latest escalation in the Middle East that has been growing increasingly unstable since the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October.

Middle East latest: US begins wave of airstrikes in Iraq and Syria

Here’s what we know so far about the strikes:

Where has been hit?

The US has hit seven facilities, four in Syria and three in Iraq, where it believes Iranian-backed militias operate.

At least 85 separate targets within those facilities have been struck.

Among them were a weapons warehouse and three houses belonging to Kata’ib Hezbollah in Anbar province, western Iraq, according to an Iraqi official who spoke to NBC in Baghdad.

Numerous aircraft were used including long-range B-1 bombers flown from the US.

A statement from US Central Command said: “US Central Command (CENTCOM) forces conducted airstrikes in Iraq and Syria against Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Quds Force and affiliated militia groups.

“US military forces struck more than 85 targets, with numerous aircraft to include long-range bombers flown from United States.

“The airstrikes employed more than 125 precision munitions.”

The strikes targeted “command and control operations, intelligence centers, rockets, and missiles, and unmanned aerial vehicle storages, and logistics and munition supply chain facilities”.

Who has been targeted?

The strikes targeted the Quds Force – the foreign espionage and paramilitary arm of the IRGC that heavily influences its allied militia across the Middle East, from Lebanon to Iraq and Yemen to Syria.

US Lieutenant General Douglas Sims, the director of the Joint Staff, said it appeared the strikes were successful, triggering large secondary explosions as the bombings hit militant weaponry, though it was not clear if any militants were killed.

But Sims added the strikes were taken knowing there would likely be casualties among those in the facilities.

US defence secretary Lloyd Austin said President Biden had directed additional action against the IRGC and those linked to it.

“This is the start of our response,” Mr Austin said.

“We do not seek conflict in the Middle East or anywhere else, but the president and I will not tolerate attacks on American forces,” he added.

Read more:
Middle East latest – calls in US for ‘devastating retaliation’
US drone response could lead to ‘uncontrolled escalation’

But the Pentagon has said it does not want war with Iran and does not believe Tehran wants war either.

Syrian state TV reported that “several” people had been killed and injured “as a result of the American aggression on a number of sites at the Badia and the Syrian-Iraqi border”.

What has been said?

President Joe Biden said: “This afternoon, at my direction, US military forces struck targets at facilities in Iraq and Syria that the IRGC and affiliated militia use to attack US forces.

“Our response began today. It will continue at times and places of our choosing.

“The United States does not seek conflict in the Middle East or anywhere else in the world. But let all those who might seek to do us harm know this: If you harm an American, we will respond.”

The Iraqi military has said the strikes “constitute a violation of Iraqi sovereignty” and “undermine the efforts of the Iraqi government”.

A spokesman added the US action posed “a threat that could lead Iraq and the region into dire consequences”.

The Palestinian Mujahideen Movement said it “strongly condemned” the “new American aggression on sites in Syria and Iraq, which is an extension of the continuous American-Zionist-Western aggression on our nation and its resources”.

An Iran-backed group in Iraq has accused Jordan, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia of letting the US use their territories to carry out attacks.

A spokesperson for the Sayyed al Shuhada Brigades, a brigade in Iraq’s Popular Mobilisation Forces linked to Kata’ib Hezbollah, called on the Iraqi government to “interrogate” its foreign minister for allowing this to happen.

Its secretary-general Abu Alaa al Walae also called for an end to the presence of US troops in Iraq.

He praised the “heroes of the Islamic Resistance” who “humiliated the American occupation” with their attacks.

The US has hit 85 targets in Iraq and Syria with airstrikes in a retaliatory attack after three American soldiers were killed at a base in Jordan.

More than 125 “precision munitions” were fired from long-range bombers flown from the US at three facilities in Iraq and four in Syria.

Middle East latest: US begins wave of airstrikes in Iraq and Syria

US Central Command said the strikes targeted Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Quds Force and affiliated militia groups.

Here is what our experts have said about the US strikes:

Security analyst Michael Clarke

“What the Americans are trying to do is to offer a big enough series of targets, 85-plus targets, and they’ll do more of it. They’ve said that.

“This will be a multi-layered operation that will be sustained. It will go on.

“A lot of aircraft have come from the United States, some B52s, and some B1Bs.

“The B52s are considerably older than the pilots who fly them but they still work pretty well and they’ll have launched quite a lot of missiles from the ships.

“Tomahawk missiles, the F22, the Super Hornets from the [USS] Eisenhower will have been involved.

“I think they’ll have had everything up tonight, probably, in order to show that they can do this.

Read more:
Three US servicemen killed in Jordan
Iran threatens decisive response if attacked

“They’ve not gone for personnel, they’ve deliberately given them warning, so that they know they’ll have dispersed and taken whatever equipment with them they can, but they’ve gone for the rest and the fixed sites.

“The message is this is the first instalment and there will be more.

“The idea is, whether it will work or not, we don’t know, that Tehran has got to think again.”

Military analyst Sean Bell

“It is no great surprise that this strike has happened. What is a surprise is that it’s taken so long for it to be enacted.

“I think part of what we’re seeing here is the very, very calculated, measured response.

“America knows that it’s on the horns of a dilemma. It was obliged to take action, following the death of those three servicemen and 40 injured in the northern part of Jordan.

“But the US doesn’t want to make a bad situation worse.

“Targeting equipment rather than populated areas sends a very clear message.

“If you want to take out [military] capability, it’s equipment and people. If you want to send a signal, you focus on equipment.

“The very fact they’ve been targeting out of populated areas, that they’ve been focused on particular military equipment, I think sends a very clear message without actually seeking to escalate.”

Footage has emerged of a cruise ship being flooded during a storm in the Gulf of Mexico – causing water to flow into people’s cabins.

Travis Hair, a passenger on the Royal Caribbean vessel, filmed as the balcony of his room on the Voyager Of The Seas was swamped.

Mr Hair said he captured the video while the vessel was “sailing through a thunderstorm” on 26 January.

He added there were “high winds on the deck… platters of food crashing to the floor in the buffet, liquor and other glass breaking, water coming in through the balconies and flooding.”

The footage also shows sunbeds piled up on the deck after being tossed around in the powerful storm.

The vessel was on its way back to Galveston, Texas, as part of a five-night trip to Cozumel, Mexico, according to USA Today.

Passenger Chelsea Ireland told the newspaper she felt the vessel tilt as it was battered by heavy winds.

She said: “When we tried to walk across our room, it felt like we were walking up a very steep hill.”

Read more from Sky News:
CIA leaker jailed for 40 years
Three killed after exploding gas cylinders spark inferno
Democrats turn on Biden over Israel support

Fellow passenger Elaina Escobedo, 21, went to her grandparent’s cabin to check on them during the storm. “There were just things flying all over the place,” she said.

Ms Escobedo added that her grandmother was safe on the sofa, but her wheelchair had rolled across the room and cups of lemonade had been knocked over.

The footage emerged after another Royal Caribbean ship, Serenade of the Seas, reportedly flooded last month.

Sky News has contacted Royal Caribbean for comment.

Tyson Fury has said he is “absolutely devastated” after a “freak” sparring injury forced him to postpone his fight against Oleksandr Usyk, the winner of which will be crowned undisputed heavyweight champion.

The British boxer, the WBC champion, was scheduled to meet his Ukrainian opponent, who holds the WBO, WBA and IBF belts, in Riyadh, later this month.

Fight promoters, Queensberry Promotions, published a picture of Fury showing a cut over his right eye.

On X, TalkSPORT boxing editor, Michael Benson, posted what was said to be “leaked” footage of the incident, in which Fury is hit by his sparring partner and promptly walks away, touching the right side of his head.

Queensberry said in a statement that a “freak cut” requiring “urgent medical attention and significant stitching” opened up above Fury’s right eye during a sparring session at his training camp in Saudi Arabia on Friday.

Fury said in the same statement: “I am absolutely devastated after preparing for this fight for so long and being in such a superb condition.

“I feel bad for everyone involved in this huge event and I will work diligently towards the rescheduled date once the eye has healed.

“I can only apologise to everyone affected.”

He said on Instagram, alongside a selfie: “Can’t help getting injured in sparring but what I can say was Usyk was in trouble. I am in fantastic shape.”

Fury sustained the cut during a sparring session with Croatian southpaw Agron Smakici, Sky Sports understands.

He had previously suffered a gaping cut around his right eye following a bloody points win over Otto Wallin in September 2019.

A Queensberry Promotions spokesperson said on X: “Whilst this is still breaking news it is clearly a massive disappointment, after the work that has been done by so many people to finally deliver the historic event to the world.

“Once the doctors have appraised Tyson’s eye, we will have a better idea of the period of recovery needed.

The aim, Queensberry said, is to “reschedule the fight as soon as possible”.

The winner of the bout stood to become the first undisputed heavyweight champion since Lennox Lewis beat Evander Holyfield in 1999 and the first in the four-belt era.