US military source says strike result of 'Syria's weakness'

According to the American source, special forces carried out the attack against a smuggling network of foreign fighters from northern Africa and other areas in the Middle East into Syria and from there to Iraq. The Americans had failed to block the smuggling network because it was operating from the Syrian side of the border.

Eight people were killed in the strike, all Syrian citizens, including a man and his four children and a couple.

"We are taking matters into our own hands," the senior American source said.

The attack took place several days after the commander of the US forces in western Iraq had said that his forces were doubling their efforts to secure the Syrian border, which he referred to as a "breached gate" being used by foreign fighters seeking to enter Iraq.

Footage aired by Syrian television (Photo: AP)

Syrian state television aired footage from the scene of the strike on Sunday night, showing blood stains on the floor of the attacked constriction site.

Akram Hamid, one of the people injured in the attack, said that he was fishing in the Euphrates River when he suddenly spotted four helicopters arriving from the border.

"One of the helicopters landed on agricultural land and eight soldiers got off," he said. "They fired for about 15 minutes, and when I tried to leave the area on my motorcycle I was hurt by a bullet in my right arm."

Jihad Makdissi, a spokesman for the Syrian Embassy in London, told the BBC that his country maintained its international right to retaliate.

"If they (the United States) have any proof of any insurgency, instead of applying the law of the jungle and penetrating, unprovoked, a sovereign country, they should come to the Syrians first and share this information," Makdissi said.

Four helicopters flying along the Euphrates River struck the Sukkariyeh Farm near the town of Abu Kamal, the Syrian government said. The helicopters attacked a civilian building under construction, firing on the workers inside and killing a number of civilians, including four children, the statement said.

A government statement carried by the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) condemned the raid and said the Foreign Ministry had summoned the charges d'affaires of the United States and Iraq to protest the strike.

Iran also condemned the US strike Monday morning. Hassan Qashqavi, a spokesman for the Iranian Foreign Ministry, said during his weekly press conference in Tehran that "we condemn any violation of countries' national sovereignty, which leads to the killing of innocent people, and this is unacceptable by us."