Iran claimed it had attacked a US “special operations command center in Tanf” in southern Syria on Friday.
There were several problems with the claim. The US denied that troops had been harmed in the attack, and a Syrian military source told reporters that there had been no attack.
Tanf was once a small US garrison in southern Syria near where the Iraq-Syria-Jordan borders meet. The US withdrew from the garrison earlier this year.
Why would Iran claim to attack an area that is apparently abandoned?
The reason for the attack was that on Thursday Syrian security forces had stopped a shipment of weapons to Hezbollah that was coming from Iraq.
Iran wants weapons to continue to flow to Hezbollah via Syria
A tanker truck full of missiles and also small drones was stopped at the border.
Iran is likely trying to send a message to Syria, as Tehran wants send weapons to Hezbollah via Syria like it did before the fall of the Assad regime, this was the case.
After the fall of the Assad regime, the new government in Syria has worked to stop Hezbollah smuggling. Not only is the new government stopping the smuggling, but it is also calling out Hezbollah by name in announcements.
By extension, it is putting a spotlight on Iraq, because the weapons are coming from there.
The weapons likely are being smuggled by Iranian-backed militias in Iraq. The US is trying to get Iraq to disarm these militias. Baghdad has said it will seek to do so. The US military is scheduled to leave Iraq in September.
Iran is worried that its ability to control Iraq via militias and also export arms to Hezbollah is being challenged. Syria has already rolled back Iranian influence.
However, Iran still has Iraq, and it can move weapons via civilian vehicles and then try to sneak them through Syria.
Iran lashes out at neighboring countries
Iran’s decision to claim it attacked Tanf is a message for Syria. Tehran has already attacked other states in the region. It usually targets US facilities in some of these states, but it is also increasingly lashing out at countries such as Kuwait and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
This is happening amid the US week-long bombing campaign on Iran that began on July 7 after Iran attacked tankers in the Gulf.
With so many front lines, Iran is seeking to keep Syria out of the conflict. Tanf was an easy target, because Iran likely knows it is abandoned. It’s possible that there are some residual forces there, from Syria possibly.
The US trained a Syrian rebel group in Tanf before the fall of the Assad regime, and the group then integrated with the Syrian security forces. The area of Tanf is a strategic area, and as such, it’s likely Syria wants to maintain forces there.
Iran has carried out attacks in Syria in the past. It once used ballistic missiles to attack what it claimed were ISIS targets. Its most recent use of the missile in Syria was in January 2024 before the fall of the Assad regime.
Iran’s Kataib Hezbollah militia in Iraq also attacked a Jordanian site called Tower 22 near the Syrian border in January 2025, killing three Americans. As such, Iran has long experience threatening Syria, Jordan, and Iraq. It remains to be seen if Iran will try to expand the war to Iraq. It has already done so in northern Iraq, attacking Kurdish sites.