Biden in a message to Congress: Syria strikes in response to the Erbil attack

Biden in a message to Congress: Syria strikes in response to the Erbil attack

Mar 02 2021

US President Joe Biden said in a letter to Congress that the airstrikes that targeted militia sites linked to Iran are a message to the attack that targeted Erbil in the middle of last month, which killed two people, one of them a contractor.

The missile strikes that hit Erbil airport and populated neighborhoods resulted in the injury of seven people, including a US service member.

Immediately, Washington blamed Iran-backed groups for carrying out the attacks on American interests, the most violent of which were the missile strikes on Erbil.

"These non-state armed groups have been implicated in the recent attacks against US personnel and the international coalition in Iraq," Biden wrote in a letter addressed on Saturday to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Interim President of the Senate Patrick Leahy.

He added that these attacks include the attack that targeted Erbil, which resulted in the injury of a US service member, and the wounding of four US contractors, one of them in serious condition, in addition to the killing of a Filipino contractor.

"These groups are also involved in the continuous planning of such attacks in the future, and in response, they directed this military action to protect and defend our personnel and partners," he explained.

Biden noted that "the United States is always prepared to take necessary and proportionate measures in self-defense, especially when the government of the country in which the threat occurs is unwilling or unable to prevent the use of its territory by the state-affiliated militias responsible for such attacks."

"I have directed this military action in line with my responsibility to protect the citizens of the United States at home and abroad and to promote the national security of the United States and foreign policy interests, pursuant to my constitutional authority to manage the foreign relations of the United States and in my capacity as commander-in-chief of the armed forces," he continued.

Washington says that its strikes have targeted more than 10 sites of the Iranian-backed Hezbollah Brigades group along the Iraqi border and that this came in response to the missile attacks against American targets in Iraq.

Washington and Tehran are seeking maximum leverage in attempts to salvage the Iran nuclear deal that was reached with world powers in 2015 before former President Donald Trump abandoned it in 2018. Since then, regional tensions have escalated in Iraq.

Source: Kurdistan 24 (translated from Arabic)





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