The Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia kills 19 U.S. servicemen.
Khobar Towers bombing
The Khobar Towers bombing was an attack on part of a housing complex in the city of Khobar, Saudi Arabia, near the national oil company headquarters of Dhahran and nearby King Abdulaziz Air Base on 25 June 1996. At that time, Khobar Towers was being used as living quarters for coalition forces who were assigned to Operation Southern Watch, a no-fly zone operation in southern Iraq, as part of the Iraqi no-fly zones.
Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in West Asia. Located in the centre of the Middle East, it covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula and has a land area of about 2,150,000 km2 (830,000 sq mi), making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the largest in the Middle East, and the twelfth-largest in the world. It is bordered by the Red Sea to the west; Jordan, Iraq, and Kuwait to the north; the Persian Gulf, Bahrain, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates to the east; Oman to the southeast; and Yemen to the south. The Gulf of Aqaba in the northwest separates Saudi Arabia from Egypt and Israel. Saudi Arabia is the only country with a coastline along both the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf, and most of its terrain consists of arid desert, lowland, steppe, and mountains. The capital and largest city is Riyadh; other major cities include Jeddah and the two holiest cities in Islam, Mecca and Medina. With a population of almost 32.2 million, Saudi Arabia is the fourth most populous country in the Arab world.
United States Armed Forces
The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. U.S. federal law names six armed forces: the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, and the Coast Guard. Since 1949, all of the armed forces, except the Coast Guard, have been permanently part of the United States Department of Defense. They form six of the eight uniformed services of the United States.