Apparently, four US helicopters just delivered a strike inside Syria, for the first time ever. Links:
Reuters
Jerusalem Post
Al Jazeera
Dissociated Press
BBC
Hopefully, this will not amount to much, but the timing of the incident is suspicious. And, of course, some family in Syria is now gone, along with the house they will never finish.
According to Jerusalem Post...
United States military helicopters bombed targets in a Syrian border town near Iraq on Sunday after Global Jihad operatives allegedly crossed the border into Syria, killing at least eight people.
The attack, which was not confirmed by the US military, was the first ever reported American strike in Syria.
Israeli defense officials said the incident was not connected to Israel and that the American troops had been chasing Global Jihad suspects in Iraq. The helicopters then crossed into Syria in pursuit of the terrorists.
MSNBC is now reporting that the strike was carried out by four choppers in a Syrian border town, at least seven people were killed, at least four of them members of the same family. There is no official statement of any kind from the US. The attack, according to SANA (Syrian official news) took place in the Bou Kamal border area. Again, according to something I am hearing on the Internet streaming radio, the attack took out a house under construction, along with some luckless people working on it.
Now, I hope this is just a case of a US mission inside Iraq going a bit too far and into Syria... something that will not escalate. However, one cannot help being extremely suspicious about the timing of this event. There always was tension on the border between Syria and the US-occupied Iraq. However, this is the first time ever the US attack a target inside Syria.
Another hypothesis outlined by Constant in the discussion downthread is that this provocation (if deliberate provocation it is) is not as much an attempt to prevent the inevitable at the polls, but to preemptively sabotage the foreign policy of the new administration.
To conclude, I think that, while the outcome of this altercation is still unclear, it is important to be aware that it took place, and to avoid unnecessary escalation or misuse of this incident for propaganda purposes. Let me also note that I find the hostile response to this diary by several commentators downthread to be quite inexplicable.