A U.S. Army CH-47 Chinook helicopter lands during a training mission at Al-Tanf Garrison in Syria, Oct. 30, 2024. U.S and Syrian forces injured in an attack on Saturday, Dec. 13, 2025, were evacuated by U.S. helicopters to the base, Syrian state media said. Two U.S. service members were killed in the ambush. (Mahsima Alkamooneh/U.S. Army)

Two U.S. service members and one American civilian have been killed and three other service members wounded in an ambush on Saturday by the Islamic State group in central Syria, U.S. Central Command said.

The attack was carried out by a lone gunman, who was engaged and killed, according to CENTCOM.

Republican Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa said the soldiers were members of the Iowa National Guard — where she, too, once served. “Our Iowa National Guard family is hurting as we mourn the loss of two of our own and pray for the recovery of the three soldiers wounded,” she said, according to The Associated Press.

CENTCOM said three service members were also wounded in the ambush Saturday. President Donald Trump said the three “seem to be doing pretty well.”

The identities of the service members killed will be withheld by the Department of Defense for 24 hours. Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said via a post on X that the service members killed were Army soldiers and the civilian was an interpreter.

“The attack occurred as the soldiers were conducting a key leader engagement,” Parnell said.

In a post on Truth Social, Trump vowed that “There will be very serious retaliation.”

“This was an ISIS attack against the U.S., and Syria, in a very dangerous part of Syria, that is not fully controlled by them,” he said in the post, which also noted that the three wounded “are doing well.”

He also included in the post that Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa was “devastated by what happened.”

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth also posted on X to condemn the attack.

The attack on U.S. troops in Syria is the first to inflict casualties since the fall of President Bashar Assad a year ago.

The attack occurred during a joint field tour with Syrian forces near Palmyra, according to a Saturday report from SANA, the state-owned news agency in Syria.

U.S. helicopters intervened to evacuate injured personnel to the Al-Tanf base in the southeast part of the country, near the border with Iraq and Jordan, according to SANA.

An earlier report by the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the attacker was a member of the Syrian security force.

Syria’s Interior Ministry spokesman Nour al-Din al-Baba said a gunman linked to ISIS opened fire at the gate of a military post. He added that Syrian authorities are looking into whether the gunman was an ISIS member or only carried its extreme ideology. He denied reports that suggested that the attacker was a security member.

Later al-Baba clarified that the attacker was a member of the Internal Security force in the desert adding that he “did not have any command post” within the forces nor was he a bodyguard for the force commander.

Al-Baba added in an interview with state TV that some 5,000 members have joined Internal Security forces in the desert and they get evaluated on weekly basis. He added that three days ago, an evaluation was made for the attacker and it turned out that he might have extreme ideology and a decision was expected to be issued regarding him on Sunday but “the attack occurred on a Saturday which is a day off for state institutions.”

The U.S. maintains about 1,000 troops in Syria, primarily as part of its anti-ISIS efforts. After the fall of longtime dictator Bashar al-Assad last year, the new government in Damascus pledged to work with the U.S.-led coalition to counter the Islamic state in Syria.

A locator map shows Syria and its capital Damascus. (AP)

The Associated Press contributed to this report.