U.S. Strikes More Than 70 ISIS Targets in Syria After Deadly Ambush

The U.S. military struck dozens of Islamic State sites in Syria on Friday in what Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth named Operation Hawkeye Strike, a response to an attack a week earlier that killed three Americans, officials told NBC News and CBS News.

Hegseth said on X that U.S. forces began the operation “to eliminate ISIS fighters, infrastructure, and weapons sites in direct response to the attack on U.S. forces that occurred on December 13th in Palmyra, Syria.” President Donald Trump said on Truth Social that the U.S. was “inflicting very serious retaliation, just as I promised, on the murderous terrorists responsible.” U.S. Central Command said it used “more than 100 precision munitions,” and a U.S. official told CBS News that more than 70 targets were hit.

The aircraft included F-15 fighters, A-10 Thunderbolts and Apache helicopters, U.S. officials told CBS News. A U.S. official told NBC News that A-10s, F-16s, Apaches and HIMARS rocket launchers were used. Both outlets reported that Jordanian F-16s supported the mission, and Jordan’s government confirmed on Saturday that its air force took part in strikes on ISIS positions in southern Syria. Two U.S. officials told NBC News that the strikes are expected to last several weeks, perhaps up to a month.

The strikes followed an ambush in Palmyra on Dec. 13 that killed two Army soldiers and a civilian interpreter. CBS News identified the soldiers as members of the Iowa National Guard. The Pentagon said a lone ISIS gunman attacked them while they were supporting a key leader in Palmyra. Syrian officials have said the assailant joined Syria’s internal security forces two months earlier and had been reassigned while under investigation over suspected ISIS ties, CBS News reported. Trump and Hegseth attended the dignified transfer at Dover Air Force Base earlier in the week.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a U.K.-based war monitor, reported that at least five ISIS members, including the leader of a cell, were killed, CBS News reported. The U.S. military did not say how many people died. Central Command added that since the Dec. 13 attack, U.S. and partner forces had carried out 10 operations in Syria and Iraq that killed or detained 23 operatives, and more than 80 counterterrorism operations in Syria over six months.

Trump also repeated his backing for Syria’s interim president, Ahmad al-Sharaa, who he said was “fully in support” of the strikes, according to CBS News. ISIS has not claimed the Palmyra attack, but it has claimed two attacks on Syrian security forces since, one of which killed four Syrian soldiers in Idlib province. The group calls al-Sharaa’s government and army “apostates.”

CBS News reported that the victims were among hundreds of U.S. troops deployed in eastern Syria as part of the coalition fighting ISIS. The Pentagon did not say how many people were killed in Friday’s strikes.