U.S. President Donald Trump addresses members of the media on Friday, December 19, 2025, in Washington, DC.
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The U.S. military launched a major attack on dozens of Islamic State locations in Syria on Friday in retaliation for attacks on U.S. service members, U.S. officials said.
The US-led coalition has carried out airstrikes and ground operations targeting Islamic State suspects in Syria in recent months, often involving Syrian security forces.
President Donald Trump has vowed to retaliate after the killing of a U.S. military personnel in Syria over the weekend in an apparent ISIS attack.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the attack targeted “ISIS fighters, infrastructure and weapons facilities” and called the operation “Operation Hawkeye.”
“This is not the start of a war. It is a declaration of revenge,” Hegseth said. “Today we hunted and killed the enemy. We killed a lot of the enemy. And we will continue,” he added.
President Trump said on social media that the Syrian government fully supported the airstrikes and that the United States was carrying out “very serious retaliation.”
In a speech Friday night in North Carolina, President Trump said the U.S. was responsible for the Dec. 13 attack on coalition forces, a “huge” blow against ISIS members.
“We attacked ISIS thugs in Syria. … We were very successful,” President Trump said at a rally in Rocky Mount, North Carolina.
The airstrikes hit more than 70 targets across central Syria, US Central Command said, adding that Jordanian warplanes supported the operation.
A U.S. official said the attack was carried out by U.S. military F-15 and A-10 fighter jets, as well as Apache helicopters and the HIMARS rocket system.
Syria reiterated its firm determination to fight the Islamic State and “not allow it to have a safe haven within Syrian territory,” the Foreign Ministry statement said.
Two American soldiers and a civilian interpreter were shot dead by an assailant targeting a convoy of American and Syrian troops in the central Syrian town of Palmyra on Saturday, the US military said. Three other U.S. soldiers were also injured in the attack.
Approximately 1,000 US troops remain in Syria.
Syria’s Interior Ministry said the attackers were members of Syrian security forces suspected of having sympathies with the Islamic State group.
The Syrian government is led by former rebels who overthrew leader Bashar al-Assad last year after a 13-year civil war, including members of Syria’s former al-Qaeda branch, which broke with al-Qaeda and clashed with Islamic State.
Syria is cooperating with the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State, and an agreement was reached during President Ahmed al-Shallah’s visit to the White House last month.
