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At least 14 people killed in Israeli strikes in Syria

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Damascus: At least 14 people, including three civilians, were killed in Israeli strikes on Syrian and Iranian targets in Syria in the early hours of Wednesday, a war monitor group and Syrian health sources said.


The “wide-scale” strikes were aimed at targets belonging to the Iranian Quds Force, a force of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard, and the Syrian military, the Israeli military tweeted.


The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group, said 11 Iranian and allied militia members, as well as Syrian army personnel,were killed in the strikes in and near the Syrian capital Damascus.


The dead included seven foreigners, the watchdog said without elaborating.


A Syrian military source said that the fatalities also included six Syrian soldiers. There was no immediate explanation for the discrepancy in figures.


While health authorities in rural Damascus put the civilian deaths at three, Syria’s official news agency SANA reported that two civilians were killed after shrapnel from an Israeli rocket hit a house in the town of Saasa, south-west of Damascus.


The Israeli strikes targeted an arms depot belonging to the Al Qudus Brigades, located south and south-west of Damascus, the observatory said. It added that the attack also hit Syrian army posts.


Israeli army spokesman Hidai Zilberman told the Israeli radio broadcaster Kan that most of the targets were in the Damascus area and included a headquarters of the Iranian militias.


Zilberman added that a Syrian anti-aircraft battery was destroyed after Israeli aircraft came under fire from surface-to-air missiles.


“We hold the Syrian regime responsible for the actions that take place in Syrian territory and warn them against allowing further attacks against Israel,” the Israeli military tweeted.


Russia condemned the Israeli strikes as a violation of international law.


“The strikes on the territory of this (Syrian) sovereign state completely violate international law,” Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov said in comments carried by the Russian news agency Interfax.


Russia, the main military backer of Syrian President Bashar al Assad, has managed to maintain close ties with both Syria and Israel throughout the Syrian civil war.


Israel’s attacks “will lead to an escalation of tensions,” Bogdanov said.


Earlier this month, three Israeli rocket attacks west of the Syrian capital Damascus targeted the house of Akram al Ajouri, a top leader of the Quds Brigade in the Palestinian Gaza Strip. Al Ajouri was not killed in the attack, although his son and another died. — dpa


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