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U.S. forces late Friday launched a large-scale assault on Islamic State targets across Syria, carrying out President Donald Trump’s pledge of “retaliation” after an ISIS gunman killed three Americans last weekend.
U.S. Central Command said American forces, operating with support from Jordan, struck more than 70 sites across central Syria. The Pentagon said fighter jets, attack helicopters, and artillery were used to deliver more than 100 precision munitions against ISIS infrastructure and weapons depots.
CENTCOM said the operation was named Operation Hawkeye Strike. In a social media statement, Trump said the mission was a direct response to last weekend’s ambush near Palmyra, where Pentagon officials say two U.S. service members and a civilian interpreter were shot and killed by an ISIS terrorist.
“Because of ISIS’s vicious killing of brave American patriots in Syria, whose beautiful souls I welcomed home to American soil earlier this week in a very dignified ceremony, I am hereby announcing that the United States is inflicting very serious retaliation, just as I promised, on the murderous terrorists responsible,” the president wrote on Truth Social. “We are striking very strongly against ISIS strongholds in Syria, a place soaked in blood which has many problems, but one that has a bright future if ISIS can be eradicated.”
“The government of Syria, led by a man who is working very hard to bring greatness back to Syria, and is fully in support,” Trump continued, writing in all caps that any terrorists who attack Americans in the future will “be hit harder than you have ever been hit before.”
Navy Adm. Brad Cooper, the commander of CENTCOM, said the strikes will degrade ISIS’s ability to target American forces.
“This operation is critical to preventing ISIS from inspiring terrorist plots and attacks against the U.S. homeland,” he said in a statement, per the Washington Times. “We will continue to relentlessly pursue terrorists who seek to harm Americans and our partners across the region.”
Since the Dec. 13 Islamic State attack, U.S. forces have conducted more than 80 operations against the militant group in Syria, U.S. Central Command said. Twenty-three ISIS operatives have been killed or captured, military officials said.
In a separate post on Truth Social, Trump referred to Syria’s new president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, who took power in Damascus in December 2024 following the overthrow of longtime Syrian President Bashar Assad.
The deaths of Americans in Syria and subsequent U.S. strikes on ISIS come at a sensitive moment for both governments. Al-Sharaa now faces questions about whether his fledgling administration can contain terrorist groups operating inside Syria.
At the same time, Trump has signaled an expansion of U.S. military activity elsewhere, including the possibility of direct strikes against Venezuela and increased operations targeting suspected drug trafficking vessels off its coast.
Any deeper U.S. engagement in Syria could face political resistance at home, where critics continue to question the objectives of the U.S. military presence in the country.
The United States has maintained a troop presence in Syria for years, even after Trump declared during his first term that the Islamic State had been “territorially defeated.” The fight against ISIS— which at its peak controlled large areas of Syria and neighboring Iraq—was the stated rationale for deploying U.S. ground forces to Syria.
Since then, the United States has kept roughly 900 to 1,000 troops in the country. That number rose to about 2,000 around the collapse of the Assad government to a rebel alliance in December 2024, but is believed to have since fallen back to about 1,000.
Pentagon officials say the U.S. forces are in Syria to conduct counterterrorism operations against ISIS. Some lawmakers, however, argue that recent American deaths show the troops are also targets, increasing the risk of wider instability in the region, the Times said.
