Iran and Syria did not immediately acknowledge the strikes, nor did their officials at the United Nations in New York respond to requests for comment from The Associated Press.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, reported that the American strikes killed six Iranian-backed fighters at an arms depot in the Harabesh neighborhood in the city of Deir el-Zour. The Observatory, which relies on a network of local contacts in Syria, said U.S. bombing at a post near the town of Mayadeen killed another two fighters.

A separate American strike hit a military post near the town of Boukamal along the border with Iraq, the Observatory said. The AP could not immediately independently confirm the report.

Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, which answers only to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has been suspected of carrying out attacks with bomb-carrying drones across the wider Middle East.

In recent months, Russia has begun using Iranian drones in its attacks on sites across Ukraine as part of its war on Kyiv. Iran has issued a series of conflicting denials about its drones being used in the war, though Western nations and experts have tied components in the drones back to Tehran.

The exchange of strikes came as Saudi Arabia and Iran have been working toward reopening embassies in each other’s countries. The kingdom also acknowledged efforts to reopen a Saudi embassy in Syria, whose embattled President Bashar Assad has been backed by Iran in his country’s long war.

U.S. Army Gen. Michael “Erik” Kurilla, the head of the American military’s Central Command, warned that American forces could carry out additional strikes if needed. “We are postured for scalable options in the face of any additional Iranian attacks,” Kurilla said in a statement.

Addressing the U.S. House Armed Services Committee on Thursday, Kurilla warned lawmakers that the “Iran of today is exponentially more militarily capable than it was even five years ago.” He pointed to Iran’s arsenal of ballistic missiles and bomb-carrying drones.

Kurilla also alleged that Iran had launched some 78 attacks on U.S. positions in Syria since January 2021.

“What Iran does to hide its hand is they use Iranian proxies,” Kurilla said.

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Diplomacy to deescalate the crisis appeared to begin immediately around the strikes. Qatar’s state-run news agency reported a call between its foreign minister and Jake Sullivan, the U.S. national security adviser. Doha has been an interlocutor between Iran and the U.S. recently amid tensions over Tehran’s nuclear program.

Qatar’s foreign minister also spoke around the same time with Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian.

Austin said he authorized the retaliatory strikes at the direction of President Joe Biden.

“As President Biden has made clear, we will take all necessary measures to defend our people and will always respond at a time and place of our choosing,” Austin said. “No group will strike our troops with impunity.”

The U.S. under Biden has struck Syria previously over tensions with Iran. In February and June of 2021, as well as August 2022, Biden launched attacks there.

U.S. forces entered Syria in 2015, backing allied forces in their fight against the Islamic State group. The U.S. still maintains the base near Hasakah in northeast Syria where Thursday’s drone strike happened. There are roughly 900 U.S. troops, and even more contractors, in Syria, including in the north and farther south and east.

Since the U.S. drone strike that killed Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani in 2020, Iran has sought “to make life difficult for US forces stationed east of the Euphrates,” said Hamidreza Azizi, an expert with the German Institute for International and Security Affairs.

“Iran increased its support for local proxies in Deir el-Zour while trying to ally with the tribal forces in the area,” Azizi wrote in a recent analysis. “Due to the geographical proximity, Iraqi groups also intensified their activities in the border strip with Syria and in the Deir el-Zour province.”

The strikes come during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Syria’s war began with the 2011 Arab Spring protests that roiled the wider Middle East and toppled governments in Egypt, Libya, Tunisia and Yemen. It later morphed into a regional proxy conflict that has seen Russia and Iran back Assad. The United Nations estimates over 300,000 civilians have been killed in the war. Those figures do not include soldiers and insurgents killed in the conflict; their numbers are believed to be in the tens of thousands.

The facility hasn’t been used in the UK since the financial pains at the onset of the pandemic exactly three years ago. This is not as dramatic a move as, for example, the Bank of England had to deploy after the mini-budget last autumn. But it is a clear sign that, although the past week has been dominated by specific issues in identifiable banks, the fall of a former giant such as Credit Suisse might be enough to ignite a more general concern.

The fear is less about the direct impact of problems at Credit Suisse or Silicon Valley Bank, but instead that a set of common factors are affecting some other institutions. For example non-insured deposits pouring out of some institutions and into larger ones at incredible speed, without anyone visiting a branch, thanks to technology, and influenced by social media commentary. There has also been an uncertain response by some regulators.

The bigger picture is, as I have said before, that rapidly rising interest rates were always going to set off some ticking timebombs under some institutions, and in some murky corners of the financial plumbing, where the players had started to become a little too reliant on very low interest rates. This is now happening.

The more calming news is that, for example here, British banks are well capitalised and have significant funding, or as the Bank of England put it on Sunday “safe and sound”. But the fact it has joined forces with its counterparts around the world represents a show of force and an attempt to prevent risks from spilling over.

In particular there is a concern that rising rates on the funds that banks lend to one another could rapidly filter into the economy and have a very real impact.

Global banking stocks slumped following the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, despite reassurances from President Joe Biden the US would do “whatever is needed” to protect the banking system.

Since SVB’s collapse, the smaller Signature Bank also fell by the wayside and First Republic needed rescuing.

On Sunday, following the takeover of Credit Suisse by its rival UBS, the Bank of England said British banks were “safe and sound” and were well capitalised with significant funding.