According to an Iraqi political faction, the U.S. government’s refusal to leave regions of Syria and plundering the country’s oil resources are part of American efforts to fund and support terrorist groups. 

A member of the Iraqi parliament’s Fatah Alliance, A’ed al-Helali, made the statements while being interviewed by the Almaalomah news agency published on Sunday. 

Helali emphasized that the U.S. forces are occupying the Syrian regions east of the Euphrates, aiming to provide financial and logistical support to the terrorist groups by exploiting the area’s oil. 

“The American forces, since their presence in the eastern Euphrates region in Syria, have been working to steal Syria’s oil extracted from the fields of that region,” Helali said. 

The senior Iraqi lawmaker insisted that the U.S. government is developing plans to generate profits from extracted Syrian oil to “finance the terrorist groups that it had created.” 

“The U.S. is not wasting money from its own budget, but is trying to find other outlets to obtain it in order to finance terrorist groups, which is what it is doing with the Syrian oil,” Helali said.

“The presence of U.S. forces in the Syrian eastern Euphrates region is for supporting these terrorist groups.” 

Tons of crude oil and grain are frequently carried by U.S. military tankers and trucks from the Hasakah province in northeastern Syria to northern Iraq’s Kurdistan region. The moves are part of Washington systematically smuggling essential commodities out of Syria. 

U.S. military equipment and forces have been stationed throughout northeastern Syria for almost a decade. According to Pentagon officials in Washington, the deployment has always aimed at protecting the Syrian oilfields from groups such as ISIS. 

However, the Syrian government says the U.S. deployment plunders Syria’s natural resources. On several occasions, former President Trump has admitted that U.S. forces were in Syria for its oil profits. 

U.S. military equipment and forces have been deployed in Syria since 2014 without Damascus’ authorization or a U.N. mandate, using the pretext of fighting ISIS. However, multiple reports show direct or indirect support from Washington through regional allies for ISIS militants over the past years. 

While ISIS has been driven out of its urban posts and fortresses throughout Iraq and Syria, sporadic attacks have recently increased in regions where U.S. forces are deployed.