Fifteen people were killed and 16 injured in Syria in an attack by Israel on Thursday. The strike attacked a number of residential buildings in suburbs of Damascus, state news agency SANA reported, citing a Syrian military source.
Israel has claimed responsibility for the attack on Syria. It said the attacks targeted military sites and the headquarters of the Islamic Jihad group.
The buildings are located in the suburbs of Mazzeh and Qudsaya, both west of the capital, the SANA report said.
The first strike was targeted around a junction which was crowded by displaced people who fled Lebanon due to Israeli attacks. The attack was at the Kaou Sudan junction near Sayyidah Zaynab. The second and third strikes were in the vicinity of a hotel and some farmhouses.
Syria’s Response
The neighbourhood of Mazzeh has been a target of previous strikes that have been blamed on Israel. It is an important neighbourhood, with several embassies, security headquarters and UN offices. Qudsaya on the other hand, is on the outskirts of the city of Damascus.
Israeli army radio said the targets of the attack in Damascus were a headquarters of the Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad and what it described as other assets, without elaborating.
Syria’s Foreign Ministry condemned the latest attack, as per an Al Jazeera report. The ministry said the missile strikes on civilian areas by Israel were “criminal”. The ministry said in a statement, “the Syrian Arab Republic condemns the aggression launched by the Zionist entity this evening.”
It also urged UN members to take swift action in “halting Israeli aggression” and holding it accountable.
Background
Israel has been carrying out strikes against Iran-linked targets in Syria for years but has ramped up such raids since last year’s Oct. 7 attack by Palestinian group Hamas on Israeli territory that sparked the Gaza war.
Commanders in Lebanon’s Hezbollah armed group and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards based in Syria have been known to reside in Mazzeh, according to residents who fled after recent strikes that killed some key figures from the groups.
Mazzeh’s high rise blocks have been used by the authorities in the past to house leaders of Palestinian factions including Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
(with inputs from Reuters)
