Reply #27: Rocket Fired at 2 U.S. Navy Ships at Port in Jordan - NYT

[rndmprsn]

AMMAN, Jordan, Aug. 19 - A rocket was fired early today at two American naval ships docked in southern Jordan, killing a Jordanian soldier and marking the first attack on American military ships in the region in five years, American and Jordanian officials said.


The U.S.S. Kearsage, an amphibious assault ship, leaving the Jordanian port of Aqaba today after the attack.

A rocket was fired at the same time from apparently the same area at an airport in a neighboring Israeli port, hitting a stretch of road and wounding a taxi driver, news agencies reported, citing Israeli officials and witnesses. A third projectile was fired at a Jordanian hospital around the southern port of Aqaba but did no damage.

No one claimed immediate responsibility for the simultaneous attacks, which displayed audacity in their use of military-style weapons and techniques. In October 2000, two suicide bombers detonated a launch loaded with explosives next to the American destroyer Cole as it was refueling in a port in Yemen. That attack, which killed 17 people and wounded 39 others, was attributed to Al Qaeda.

The attack today on the American vessels, the Ashland and the Kearsarge, took place around 8:44 a.m. and missed two naval ships at dock in Aqaba, said Capt. Ryan Fitzgerald of the United States Air Force, a spokesman for the American military command in the Middle East. The tocket flew over the ships and landed on a warehouse at the pier, he said.