US Navy destroyer shoots down rebel missiles as Iran-backed militants stir up trouble and American forces come under fire

• A US Navy ship shot down missiles and drones launched by Iran-backed rebels on Thursday.
• The incident comes amid recent drone attacks against American forces in Iraq and Syria.

A US Navy ship shot down several missiles and drones launched by an Iran-backed militant group on Thursday. The destabilizing incident is one of several that has occurred over the past few days amid soaring tensions across the Middle East.

The crew of the USS Carney, a Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer, shot down three land-attack cruise missiles and several drones that were fired by Houthi rebels from Yemen, Pentagon Press Secretary Air Force Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder told reporters on Thursday. The threats were traveling in a northern direction along the Red Sea, "potentially" toward targets in Israel, he added, and were shot down over the water. There were no reported casualties among US forces or civilians as a result of the incident.

The Tehran-backed Houthis have been fighting a brutal civil war against Yemen's internationally recognized government, which is backed by a Saudi-led coalition. Throughout this past winter, Western forces regularly raided boats attempting to smuggle weapons from Iran to Yemen, which Washington says violates a United Nations Security Council resolution.

The Carney is not the only US asset in the region that's been forced to take action this week.

Early Wednesday morning local time, the al-Tanf garrison — a military base in southern Syria — was targeted by two drones, Ryder said. US and coalition troops destroyed one of the drones, while the other "impacted" the base and caused minor injuries to coalition forces.

And US Central Command said on Wednesday that within the past 24 hours the military defended against three drones — destroying two and damaging a third — in two separate incidents across western and northern Iraq. One of the incidents resulted in minor injuries to coalition forces.

"In this moment of heightened alert, we are vigilantly monitoring the situation in Iraq and the region," the command said in a statement on the matter, emphasizing that the US will defend American and coalition forces against "any threat."

Ryder said the drones that were downed in Iraq and Syria were shot down by "defensive systems" on the respective facilities, as opposed to by fighter jets.

"We take force protection extremely seriously, and we will continue to do so," Ryder said. "When we have forces in harm's way, we're going to look at all possible efforts to ensure that they remain safe and are able to stay focused on their mission."

"These small-scale attacks are clearly concerning and dangerous," he added. "We're going to do everything necessary to ensure that we're protecting our forces, and if and when we choose to respond, we'll do so at a time of our choosing."

The incidents come amid heightened tensions across the Middle East in the wake of an explosion at a hospital in the Gaza Strip on Tuesday. Hamas blamed the blast on an Israeli airstrike, and Israel blamed on a failed rocket launched by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group.

The US has said that its current assessment of what happened is in line with Israel's explanation, and a former United Nations war crimes investigator told Insider the visual evidence from the explosion is "inconsistent" with an Israeli airstrike, an analysis that other experts and observers have noted.

Even in the face of this evidence, many Middle Eastern countries decided to pin blame on Israel, and protesters throughout the region flooded the streets in anger, triggering safety advisories from US embassies.

The explosion has fueled fears that Iran or one of its proxy groups — like Lebanon's Hezbollah — might join the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas, which started after the latter's October 7 terror attacks.

Nearly two weeks ago, Hamas fighters stormed into southern Israel and massacred at least 1,300 people, injuring over 4,200 more. Israeli fighter jets immediately began a bombing campaign of the Gaza Strip, which is still ongoing and has killed at least 3,000 people and injured over 12,000 more, according to the latest UN figures.

In an attempt to deter Iran and its proxies from opening up a second front and turning the war into a broader regional conflict, the US has deployed two US Navy carrier strike groups to the region and augmented existing firepower with more fighter aircraft.

"Right now, this conflict is contained between Israel and Hamas, and we're going to do everything we can to ensure deterrence in the region so that this does not become a broader regional conflict," Ryder said.