Three rockets were fired at two US Navy ships in Jordan's Aqaba port on Friday, but they missed their targets and hit a warehouse and a hospital, killing a Jordanian soldier and striking the Israeli port of Eilat.

An al-Qaida linked group claimed responsibility for the rocket attacks.

Al-Qaida Organization in the Levant and Egypt said in a statement posted on an Islamist website that its guerrillas fired "three Katyusha rockets" on the Aqaba and Eilat ports.

"A group of mujahedeen (holy warriors) ... targeted a group of US warships moored in the port of Aqaba, in addition to the port of Eilat with three Katyusha rockets," said the statement.

"The mujahedeens returned safely to base," said the statement whose authenticity could not be verified.

"The Zionists are a legitimate target for us, as we have blown them up in Taba, we have targeted them in Eilat, and soon in Tel Aviv," it said.

The same group has claimed the deadly anti-Israeli bombings on October 7 in the Egyptian resort of Taba and the July 23 bombings of the nearby tourist-packed Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.

A Jordanian security source said authorities were searching for three men in the Katyusha missile attack, which was launched from an industrial warehouse area near the entrance to the city.

"We are searching for a Syrian and two Iraqis who are in Aqaba and used Kuwaiti number plates," the source said.

Immediately after the attack, the two US amphibious assault ships, which had been on a joint training exercise with the Jordanian navy, weighed anchor and headed for the safety of open water.

Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz said "one or two" Katyusha rockets fell in the airport and hotel area of Eilat, which is about 9 kilometers across the Red Sea from Aqaba, but no one was hurt.
 
The US Fifth Fleet in Bahrain said one missile narrowly missed the USS Ashland, an amphibious warfare ship that is designed to transport Marines and to launch assault landing craft and helicopters.

"I can confirm that a rocket flew over the bow of USS Ashland and the rocket impacted in the roof of a warehouse. No sailors or Marines were injured," Commander Jeff Breslau of the US Fifth Fleet in Bahrain said.

"It's pretty safe to conclude that they were probably trying to hit one or both of the ships," he said.

A Jordanian military source said Private Ahmad Alnajdawi, who had been standing guard at the warehouse, was killed.

The source said a total of three missiles, which are of a Soviet design, had been fired, hitting the warehouse and a military hospital in the city, and Eilat.

A Jordanian Interior Ministry source said: "At least two rockets were fired from the industrial warehouse area at the entrance of the city at US vessels docked in the port and they missed."

Breslau said the Ashland and sister amphibious ship the USS Kearsarge, both of which are based in Norfolk, Virginia, had immediately left the port following the attack.

Jordanian Interior Minister Awni Yarfas said little damage had been caused to the warehouse in the port, which is a logistics hub for Iraq, used by the US military and for moving commodities.

(China Daily August 20, 2005)