A United States aircraft shot down a manned fighter jet of the Syrian government on Sunday, the Pentagon said in a statement. The move came shortly after troops of the Bashar al-Assad regime attacked US-backed fighters known as the Syrian Democratic Forces in a village southwest of Raqqa, The Washington Post reported.
This is the fourth time within a month that the US military has targeted the Syrian defence, according to the WaPo report.
The Syrian military said that the jet shot down had been carrying out anti-Islamic State operations, and that its lone pilot was killed in the strike. “The attack stresses coordination between the US and ISIS, and it reveals the evil intentions of the US in administrating terrorism and investing it to pass the US-Zionist project in the region,” it said.
However, Spokesperson for the US Central Command Colonel John Thomas said Islamic State terrorists were not present in the Ja’Din village and that it was controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces.
Iran retaliates to June 7 attack in Tehran
The Iranian military on Sunday said it had launched a number of missiles into eastern Syria in retaliation to the June 7 attacks in Tehran (pictured above).
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said that several “ground-to-ground, mid-range missiles” were fired from bases in West Iran’s Kermanshah province. They targeted “Takfiri [Islami State] forces in the Deir Ezzor region in Eastern Syria”, CNN reported.
A dozen people were killed and 39 others were injured after four gunmen of the Islamic State and suicide bombers stormed Iran’s parliament and the Mausoleum of Imam Khomeini in Tehran. The attacks had lasted five hours, and all the assailants were killed, according to the police.
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