ISIS in Syria. Photo courtesy of Hawar News Agency (ANHA).US forces executed a strike in Syria on Friday and killed an Al-Qaeda leader in response to the attack on US forces last month in Palmyra, Syria, that killed two Iowa National Guardsmen. The target in the strike, Bilal Hasan al-Jasim, was “affiliated with Al-Qaeda who had direct ties to an ISIS terrorist responsible for an ambush which killed two U.S. service members and an American interpreter on Dec. 13, 2025,” US Central Command said.“Bilal Hasan al-Jasim was an experienced terrorist leader who plotted attacks and was directly connected with the ISIS gunman who killed and injured American and Syrian personnel last month in Palmyra, Syria,” they added.The deceased Soldiers were identified as Sgt. William Nathaniel Howard, 29, of Marshalltown, Iowa, and Sgt. Edgar Brian Torrestovar, 25, of Grimes, Iowa. The interpreter was Iraqi national Ayad Sakat, who immigrated to the US in 2007 after working with the US Army.This is not the first retaliatory attack the US has carried out since the December 13 ambush.As The Gateway Pundit reported, War Secretary Pete Hegseth announced that US forces executed “Operation Hawkeye Strike” against ISIS facilities on December 19, 2025, a “direct response to the attack on U.S. forces that occurred on December 13th in Palmyra, Syria.”President Trump also gave a strong warning to terrorists, writing, “All terrorists who are evil enough to attack Americans are hereby warned — YOU WILL BE HIT HARDER THAN YOU HAVE EVER BEEN HIT BEFORE IF YOU, IN ANY WAY, ATTACK OR THREATEN THE U.S.A.”JUST IN: “YOU WILL BE HIT HARDER THAN YOU HAVE EVER BEEN HIT BEFORE IF YOU, IN ANY WAY, ATTACK OR THREATEN THE U.S.A.” – Trump and Hegseth Announce “Lots of” Enemies Killed in Operation Hawkeye Strike, a “Declaration of Vengeance” in Response to ISIS Killing US Troops Syria (VIDEO)/*! This file is auto-generated */!function(d,l){"use strict";l.querySelector&&d.addEventListener&&"undefined"!=typeof URL&&(d.wp=d.wp||{},d.wp.receiveEmbedMessage||(d.wp.receiveEmbedMessage=function(e){var t=e.data;if((t||t.secret||t.message||t.value)&&!/[^a-zA-Z0-9]/.test(t.secret)){for(var s,r,n,a=l.querySelectorAll('iframe[data-secret="'+t.secret+'"]'),o=l.querySelectorAll('blockquote[data-secret="'+t.secret+'"]'),c=new RegExp("^https?:$","i"),i=0;i