Two US Army soldiers and an interpreter killed in attack in Syria, Pentagon says

Two U.S. Army soldiers and an American interpreter were killed Saturday in an ambush in Syria carried out by a “lone ISIS gunman,” officials said.

“Today in Palmyra, Syria, two US Army soldiers and one US civilian interpreter were killed, and three were wounded,” wrote Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell at XUS Central Command, adding that the deaths and injuries were “the result of an ambush by a lone ISIS gunman in Syria.”

“The attack occurred while the soldiers were conducting an engagement with a key leader. Their mission was to support ongoing counterterrorism and counter-ISIS operations in the region,” Parnell said, noting that “the soldiers' names, as well as identifying information about their units, will be withheld until 24 hours after next of kin notification.”

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth added that “the savage who carried out this attack was killed by associated forces.”

“Let it be known, if you attack Americans, anywhere in the world, you will spend the rest of your short, anxious life knowing that the United States will hunt you down, find you, and kill you without mercy,” Hegseth also said in a post on X.

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Parnell said the attack is currently under investigation. A Pentagon official told Fox News Digital that the attack took place in a location where Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa has no control.

Fox News Digital has reached out to the White House for further comment.

A senior US official previously confirmed to Fox News that there were multiple injuries after US service members were ambushed in Syria.

President Donald Trump meets with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa at the White House on November 10, 2025. A Pentagon official told Fox News Digital that the attack on soldiers on Saturday, December 13, 2025, took place in a location where Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa has no control. (Syrian Presidency/Anadolu via Getty Images)

“The United States, the CIA and the military are reportedly deeply involved in securing and stabilizing the situation in Syria,” Dan Diker, president of the Jerusalem Center for Foreign Affairs and Security, recently told Fox News Digital.

Those wounded in Saturday's attack were flown by helicopter to the al-Tanf garrison, which is near the border with Iraq and Jordan, The Associated Press reported, citing Syrian state media.

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U.S. Army soldiers prepare to go on patrol from a remote combat outpost May 25, 2021 in northeastern Syria. (John Moore/Getty Images)

In June, the United States had about 1,500 troops left in Syria following Pentagon-ordered withdrawals and consolidations, and that number was expected to drop to just several hundred by the end of this year, according to Fox News Chief National Security Correspondent Jennifer Griffin.

Griffin reported that the United States had eight bases in Syria to monitor ISIS since the US military moved in to prevent the terrorist group from establishing a caliphate in 2014, although three of those bases have since been closed or handed over to the Syrian Democratic Forces.

On Monday, tens of thousands of Syrians flooded the streets of Damascus to mark the first anniversary of the collapse of the Assad regime.

U.S. Army soldiers stand near an armored military vehicle on the outskirts of Rumaylan in Syria's northeastern Hasakeh province on the border with Turkey on March 27, 2023. (Delil Souleiman/AFP via Getty Images)

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Those celebrations came a year after former Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad fled the capital as rebel forces swept through the country in a lightning offensive that ended five decades of rule by the Assad family and opened a new chapter in Syrian history.

Fox News' Ashley Oliver, Jennifer Griffin, Benjamin Weinthal and Ashley Carnahan contributed to this report.