Iran has refuted allegations of involvement in a drone strike that resulted in the death of three US troops at a military base in northeast Jordan.
While an Iran-backed militia based in Iraq claimed responsibility for four attacks in the area, the Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Nasser Kanaani, emphasized at a press briefing that regional resistance factions operate independently and do not receive orders from Iran.
The group Islamic Resistance in Iraq asserted in a statement that it targeted a US garrison at al-Tanf, near the Jordan-Syria border, along with two other US bases in the region and an Israeli oil facility.
Identification of 3 Soldiers in Jordan Attack
In a press release issued on Monday, the Defense Department officially identified the three deceased American service members as Army reservists: Sgt. William Jerome Rivers, 46, of Carrollton, Georgia; Spc. Kennedy Ladon Sanders, 24, of Waycross, Georgia; along with Spc. Breonna Alexsondria Moffett, 23, of Savannah, Georgia.
According to a US defense official, preliminary reports suggest that a drone approached the Tower 22 base at a low and slow altitude simultaneously with the return of a US drone from a mission.
The air defense system’s auto-response features were disabled to prevent the inadvertent engagement of the returning American drone, leading to minimal or no advance notice of the impending attack.
At the time of the early morning assault, the majority of the approximately 350 US troops stationed at the base were still within their sleeping quarters.
The accommodations on the base provide limited structural protection against incoming attacks. As a result, more than 40 individuals sustained injuries in the incident, as conveyed by spokesperson Sabrina Singh in a briefing to reporters on Monday.