The US occupation army smuggled a convoy of 31 vehicles from Syria to Iraq in the early hours of 2 August, including several tanker trucks filled with oil plundered from the resource-rich Jazira region.
According to local sources, the oil was transferred to US bases in northern Iraq via the illegal Al-Waleed border crossing.
Nearly 200 tanker trucks filled with looted oil were smuggled out of Syria by US troops in July alone, as Washington has intensified its practice of stealing Syria’s resources to sell abroad.
The occupation army is also responsible for plundering the country’s wheat, exacerbating an acute food crisis.
Syria’s grain output dropped from an annual average of 4.1 million tons prior to the US-sponsored war, to an estimated 1.05 million tons in 2021, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
The World Food Programme (WFP) says 12.4 million Syrians, or close to 70 percent of people in the country today, are food insecure.
Once a major wheat producer, Syria is now facing food shortages after 11 years of war. On top of this, soaring fertilizer prices as a result of the NATO-instigated war in Ukraine have left farmers unable to use large portions of their fields.
US troops and their proxy militia in northern Syria – the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) – control most of the oil fields in Hasakah and Deir Ezzor governorates, operating under the pretext of “protecting” Syria’s resources from falling under the control of ISIS.
Several nations — including Russia and China — have called on the US government to stop stealing Syria’s resources.
Popular discontent in the northeast of the country is also growing, as citizens have often set up road blockades to prevent the US occupation army from entering their towns.
Attacks on US military bases by local resistance factions have also become commonplace, with rocket attacks taking place on a monthly basis.
The deployment of US forces in Syria is illegal under international law, as it was implemented without the consent of Damascus or the UN.