BEIRUT (AFP) – Syrian state media said yesterday that overnight Israeli strikes killed 14 people in central Hama province, with a war monitor reporting a higher death toll in raids on sensitive military sites.
The Israeli military, which has carried out hundreds of strikes in Syria since the start of the civil war there in 2011, declined to comment on the latest reported attack.
Syrian official news agency SANA, citing a medical source, said, “The number of martyrs resulting from the Israeli aggression on a number of sites in the vicinity of Masyaf has risen to 14 martyrs and 43 wounded including six critically.”
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor reported “intense Israeli strikes” overnight, giving a death toll of “18 people” including eight Syrian fighters. It said 32 others were wounded.
Israeli strikes on Syria since 2011 have mainly targeted army positions and Iran-backed fighters including from Lebanon’s Hezbollah group.
Israeli authorities rarely comment on individual strikes in Syria, but have repeatedly said they will not allow arch-enemy Iran to expand its presence.
Syria’s SANA news agency, citing a military source, reported that at “around 11.20pm (2020GMT) on Sunday, the Israeli enemy carried out an air attack” from the direction of northwest Lebanon “targeting a number of military sites in the central region”.
Air defences “shot down some” of the missiles, SANA reported.
The Observatory said “Israeli strikes… targeted the scientific research area in Masyaf” in Hama province and other sites, destroying “buildings and military centres”.
The Britain-based Observatory, which relies on a network of sources inside Syria, had earlier said the strikes targeted sites “where pro-Iran groups and weapons development experts are stationed”. It was “one of the most violent Israeli attacks” in Syria in years, Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.
