Israel generally does not confirm or deny airstrikes on hostile targets in Syria, which serve as bases for Hezbollah terrorists and Iranian forces.
By United with Israel and AP
Israeli fighter jets flying over Lebanon fired missiles at targets near Damascus early on Monday, the Syrian military and state media said, while a war monitoring group said four Iran-backed fighters were also killed.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a group that tracks the Syrian civil war, said the missiles hit positions belonging to Iran and its regional proxies, killing four fighters and causing damage south of Damascus. It did not give the nationalities of the dead gunmen.
Last week, an Israeli airstrike targeted Iranian and Iran-backed fighters in the desert near the central Syrian town of Palmyra. SOHR said the strike killed nine fighters, including six who were not Syrians.
The Syrian military claimed in a statement, which was carried by state media, that some of the missiles that made it to the target near the Syrian capital caused material damage.
According to the statement, the airstrike took place around dawn.
Israel did not comment on the Syrian report. In the past, Israel has acknowledged carrying out scores of airstrikes over the years, most aimed at Iranian personnel, weapons, and other military assets, with which it arms Hezbollah, voted the richest terror organization in the world by Forbes magazine.
In addition to its terror activities, Hezbollah also runs a global narcotics trafficking and money laundering operation.
In recent months, Israeli officials have rung the alarms regarding Hezbollah’s attempts to produce precision guided missiles.
Earlier in April, an Israeli drone fired two missiles near an SUV carrying Hezbollah members in Syria, close to the border with Lebanon. No one was hurt in the attack.
Two days after the drone attack, Israel announced that Hezbollah had carried out “provocative” activity, including multiple attempts to breach the border along the Lebanese-Israeli frontier, and said it would complain to the U.N. Security Council.
On March 31, Israeli warplanes fired missiles on the Shayrat air base also in the central province of Homs.
Israel has repeatedly warned that Iranian military entrenchment crosses a red line that it will not tolerate.