Iran distances itself from attack on US troops

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Iran distanced itself on Monday from an attack that killed three US soldiers as pressure built domestically on President Joe Biden to respond against Tehran.

A day after the US blamed “radical Iran-backed militant groups” for the drone strike on a military base in north-east Jordan, Iran’s foreign ministry denied any link to the assault.

The ministry said accusations of Iran’s involvement in the deaths of the US personnel were “baseless”, calling them a “conspiracy” by those “interested in dragging the US into a new conflict in the region to intensify the crisis”.

IRNA, Iran’s official news agency, quoted Tehran’s mission to the UN as saying that the Islamic republic had “no connection to these attacks, and the clashes are between the US army and resistance groups in the region, who reciprocally confront each other”.

The deaths mark the first time US troops have been killed in an attack in the Middle East since the Israel-Hamas war began in Gaza in October.

Top Republicans in Congress have called for direct strikes on Iran in response. “Hit Iran now. Hit them hard,” senator Lindsey Graham wrote on X, while senator John Cornyn wrote: “Target Tehran.”

In a posting on his Truth Social network, former president Donald Trump labelled the attack a “horrific and tragic consequence of Joe Biden’s weakness and surrender” but called for no specific action. “We are on the brink of World War 3,” he added.

The attack, which US defence officials said also injured at least 34 service members, struck the Tower 22 outpost near Jordan’s border with Syria, which houses 350 US military personnel as part of the coalition against Isis.

US forces in Syria and Iraq have come under repeated assault by a newly created group of Iran-backed militias known as the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, which says it is retaliating for…