US likely to attack Iran directly

Pressure is mounting on U.S. President Joe Biden to attack Iran directly after three U.S. troops were killed and more than 30 others injured in a drone attack on an American outpost in northeastern Jordan.

While hitting Iranian targets is an option, analysts say the U.S. is more likely to strike one or more of Iranian-supported proxy groups based in Iraq and Syria -- but acknowledge it is increasingly difficult for Washington to sidestep direct confrontation with Tehran.

Biden has been reluctant to directly strike Iran, fearing it may plunge the crisis-riddled Middle East into a wider conflict amid the wars in Gaza and Yemen and Huthi rebel attacks on maritime ships in the Red Sea and counterstrikes by U.S. and British forces.

But the deaths and dozens of casualties of U.S. troops in a drone attack on the Tower 22 military outpost in Jordan, near the border with Syria, may compel the United States to deliver a stronger-than-usual response. The attack was claimed by the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella organization comprised of Iranian-backed militias.