WASHINGTON – Calling for calm in the Middle East, top U.S. national security leaders said Tuesday that they and allies are directly pressing Israel, Iran and others to avoid escalating the conflict, even as the U.S. moved more troops to the region and threatened retaliation if American forces are attacked.
“It’s urgent that everyone in the region take stock of the situation, understand the risk of miscalculation, and make decisions that will calm tensions, not exacerbate them,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said at the close of a meeting with Australian leaders.
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At the same time, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin noted the attack Monday on U.S. forces in Iraq by an Iranian-backed militia group, which injured seven personnel, and made it clear that the U.S. won't hesitate to respond.
“Make no mistake, the United States will not tolerate attacks on our personnel in the region,” Austin told reporters at a press conference after the meeting. “And we remain ready to deploy on short notice to meet the evolving threats to our security, our partners or our interests.”
He said an “Iranian-backed Shia militia group” conducted the attack, but officials are still trying to determine which one.
Blinken and Austin met with Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Defense Minister Richard Marles at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, to discuss efforts to expand military cooperation and broaden diplomatic efforts in the Asia Pacific.
But they led their remarks with calls for de-escalation and support for a cease-fire. “Australia also underlines the risks to all in the region of escalation and of miscalculation,” said Wong, calling this a “decisive moment” for a cease-fire in the war between Israel and Hamas.
Their comments came as Hamas named Yahya Sinwar — a masterminded of the Oct. 7 attacks in Israel that set off the war — as its new leader, fueling fears that the announcement will provoke Israel and that tensions will escalate into broader war.
Tehran has also vowed revenge against Israel over the killing last week of Hamas’ top political leader in Iran, and Lebanon's Hezbollah is threatening retaliation over an Israeli strike that killed one of the group's senior commanders in Beirut.
It has all complicated efforts by American, Egyptian and Qatari mediators to salvage negotiations over the cease-fire and hostage release deal in Gaza.
Blinken said further attacks will only perpetuate conflict, adding that “we’ve been engaged in intense diplomacy with allies and partners communicating that message directly to Iran. We communicated that message directly to Israel.”
Still, Austin laid out a number of U.S. military troops movements in recent days to help defend Israel from possible attacks by Iran and its proxies and to safeguard U.S. troops, including the deployments of additional fighter jets. He also said the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier will replace the USS Theodore Roosevelt in the region “later this month.”
According to a U.S. official, about a dozen F/A-18 fighter jets and an E-2D Hawkeye surveillance aircraft from the USS Theodore Roosevelt flew from the Gulf of Oman to a military base in the Middle East on Monday.
The Navy jets' land-based deployment is expected to be temporary, because a squadron of Air Force F-22 fighter jets is enroute to the same base from their home station in Alaska. The roughly dozen F-22s are expected to arrive in the Middle East in the coming days, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss troop movements.
It’s not clear how long all of the aircraft will remain together at the base, and that may depend on what — if anything — happens in the next few days.
U.S. officials released more details on Tuesday about the rocket attack that hit the military base in Iraq on Tuesday. They said five U.S. service members and two contractors were hurt when two rockets hit the al-Asad airbase.
The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss military personnel, said five of those injured were being treated at the airbase and two were evacuated, but all seven were in stable condition. They did not provide details on who was evacuated.
The rocket attack is the latest in what has been an uptick in strikes on U.S. forces by Iranian-backed militias. It comes as tensions across the Middle East are spiking but is not believed to be connected to the Hezbollah and Hamas killings.
In recent weeks, Iranian-backed Iraqi militias have resumed launching attacks on bases housing U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria after a lull of several months, following a strike on a base in Jordan in late January that killed three American soldiers and prompted a series of retaliatory U.S. strikes.
Between October and January, an umbrella group calling itself the Islamic Resistance in Iraq had regularly claimed attacks that it said were in retaliation for Washington’s support of Israel in its war against Hamas in Gaza and were aimed at pushing U.S. troops out of the region.