The U.S. and the coalition have a base in At Tanf, Syria, close to where the Iraqi, Jordanian and Syrian borders intersect, 80 miles south of Palmyra.
Though the two incidents were nominally unrelated, they have a common cause: the drive by Iran and Russian Federation, along with their Syrian and Iraqi Shiite clients, to dominate the space that will be left when the Islamic State is driven from its capital of Raqqa in eastern Syria, which is under assault from USA -backed Kurdish and Syrian Arab forces. It said operations would continue over Iraq.
The Iran-made Shaheed-129 was displaying hostile intent, he said.
BEIRUT (AP) - Syrian government troops and their allies have steadily positioned themselves in key areas on the flanks of the USA -led coalition battle for the Islamic State's self-declared capital of Raqqa.
"Over the last four weeks, the USA has conducted three air strikes on pro-regime forces backed by Iran that have moved into a deconfliction zone around the town of Tanf in southwestern Syria, where there is a coalition training base for local forces fighting ISIS".
Russia, also an ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, issued a warning of its own to the United States in response to the downing of the Syrian jet, saying on Monday it would view as targets any planes flying west of the Euphrates River, though it stopped short of saying it would shoot any down.
Australia's halt in operations came after Russia's Defense Ministry said on Monday that "all kinds of airborne vehicles, including aircraft and UAVs of the global coalition...will be tracked by the Russian SAM systems as air targets" if flying west of the Euphrates River in Syria.
Iran says it attacked IS fighters in eastern Syria with long-range missiles on Sunday.
Sunday's downing of a regime jet prompted the Russian ministry of defense to announce that it would suspend the de-confliction hotline with the coalition, which is created to prevent any accidents in the skies over Syria.
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The U.S. military failed to use the communication line with Russia concerning this attack, despite the fact that Russian warplanes were also on a mission in Syrian airspace at the time, the Russian Defense Ministry said.
On Tuesday, the Australian military said that it was temporarily suspending air operations over Syria "as a precautionary measure".
Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) began advancing toward Raqqa in November, constantly covered by US-led airstrikes.
The area falls in a part of Syria that was recently identified as military priority by Damascus, and strategically important for Iran as it seeks to secure a land corridor between forces it backs in Syria and Iraq.
Field operatives from the Quds Force, the branch of the Guards responsible for operations outside Iran's borders, gathered intelligence on the targets inside Syria before the strike, the Guards' statement said.
The global coalition led by the United States was hit by Syrian drones, CNN reported.
Aron Lund, also a fellow at the Century Foundation, said that even though Russian Federation and the USA may not be interested in an escalation, it is not a given that they can help their allies in Syria avoid it.
A U.S. senator has warned against the United States' measures in Syria, which is pushing Washington "closer and closer" to a military conflict with Iran and Russian Federation, describing the move as "another mistake on the scope of the Iraq War". USA commanders have twice bombed convoys that entered an exclusion zone around a border town where American advisers are based and they have destroyed a drone.
Russia, which supports the government of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad militarily, called the downing of the Syrian plane an "act of aggression" and a violation of global law.
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