{"id":459208,"date":"2025-12-20T03:49:11","date_gmt":"2025-12-20T03:49:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/459208\/"},"modified":"2025-12-20T03:49:11","modified_gmt":"2025-12-20T03:49:11","slug":"hegseth-announces-operation-to-eliminate-isis-fighters-in-syria-after-americans-killed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/459208\/","title":{"rendered":"Hegseth announces operation to \u2018eliminate ISIS fighters\u2019 in Syria after Americans killed"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has announced the start of an operation to \u201celiminate ISIS fighters, infrastructure, and weapons sites\u201d in Syria following the deaths of three U.S. citizens.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is not the beginning of a war \u2014 it is a declaration of vengeance. The United States of America, under President Trump\u2019s leadership, will never hesitate and never relent to defend our people,\u201d he said Friday on social media.<\/p>\n<p>Two Iowa National Guard members and a U.S. civilian interpreter were killed Dec. 13 in\u00a0an attack in the Syrian desert\u00a0that the Trump administration has blamed on the Islamic State group. The slain National Guard members were among hundreds of U.S. troops deployed in eastern Syria as part of a coalition fighting IS.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/newshour\/nation\/u-s-army-names-2-iowa-national-guard-members-killed-in-attack-in-syria\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>READ MORE:<\/strong> U.S. Army names 2 Iowa National Guard members killed in attack in Syria<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Soon after word of the deaths, President Donald Trump pledged \u201cvery serious retaliation\u201d but stressed that Syria was fighting alongside U.S. troops. Trump has said Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa was \u201cextremely angry and disturbed by this attack\u201d and the shooting attack by a gunman came as the\u00a0U.S. military is expanding its cooperation\u00a0with Syrian security forces.<\/p>\n<p>A U.S. official told The Associated Press that the attack was conducted using F-15 Eagle jets, A-10 Thuderbolt ground attack aircraft and AH-64 Apache helicopters. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive operations, said more strikes should be expected.<\/p>\n<p>When asked for further information, the Pentagon referred AP to Hegseth\u2019s social media post.<\/p>\n<p>White House officials noted that Trump had made clear that retaliation was coming.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPresident Trump told the world that the United States would retaliate for the killing of our heroes by ISIS in Syria, and he is delivering on that promise,\u201d White House deputy press secretary Anna Kelly said in a statement.<\/p>\n<p>Trump this week met privately with the families of the slain Americans at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware before he joined top military officials and other dignitaries on the tarmac for the dignified transfer, a solemn and largely silent ritual honoring U.S. service members killed in action.<\/p>\n<p>The guardsmen\u00a0killed in Syria on Saturday were Sgt. Edgar Brian Torres-Tovar, 25, of Des Moines, and Sgt. William Nathaniel Howard, 29, of Marshalltown, according to the U.S. Army. Ayad Mansoor Sakat, of Macomb, Michigan, a U.S. civilian working as an interpreter, was also killed.<\/p>\n<p>\n                    A free press is a cornerstone of a healthy democracy.\n                <\/p>\n<p class=\"invite_body\">\n                    Support trusted journalism and civil dialogue.\n                <\/p>\n<p>                <a href=\"https:\/\/give.newshour.org\/page\/88646\/donate\/1?ea.tracking.id=pbs_news_sept_2025_article&amp;supporter.appealCode=N2509AW1000100\" class=\"donation-link ga-click-funding ga-click-ender-funding\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><br \/>\n                    Donate now<\/p>\n<p>                <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has announced the start of an operation to \u201celiminate ISIS fighters,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":459209,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,3],"tags":[50,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-459208","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"category-us","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-united-states","11":"tag-unitedstates","12":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115749857786553224","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/459208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=459208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/459208\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/459209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=459208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=459208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=459208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}