Syria
A cloud of smoke rises after an Israeli airstrike targetted the Syrian capital city of Damascus on July 20, 2020. File photo: AFP
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - An Israeli strike on Monday in Syria’s Homs province injured at least two people, while Tel Aviv claims to have targeted weapon smuggling routes used by Iran-backed Lebanese Hezbollah.
“At around 09:00 p.m. on Monday, the Israeli enemy launched an aerial act of aggression from the direction of Lebanese territory, targeting the crossing points that it had previously targeted on the Syrian-Lebanese border in al-Qusayr area in Homs countryside,” Syrian state media (SANA) reported citing a military source as saying.
The strikes injured two civilians, according to SANA.
The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) said on X that it targeted routes managed by Hezbollah, which involve “storing thousands of missiles and other weapon components in Syrian military warehouses and transferring them through internal crossings.”
“The IDF has conducted extensive operations to disrupt these efforts by targeting key smuggling routes used to arm Hezbollah, preventing future attacks on Israeli civilians,” the IDF said.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a UK-based war monitor, reported that at least two members of Hezbollah were killed, and five others were injured as a result of the strikes.
According to SOHR, Israel targeted several bridges on the Orontes River, which flows from Lebanon into Syria, and the Jusiyah crossing on the Syria-Lebanon border.
Israel is blamed for hundreds of airstrikes on regime-controlled areas in Syria through its more than a decade-long civil war, often targeting pro-Iran militias, such as Lebanon’s Hezbollah group that supports the Syrian army.
The strikes have increased since October 7 of last year, when Palestinian Hamas launched an unprecedented attack on Israel, which retaliated by invading Gaza. The conflict has now spread to Lebanon.
Last week, a suspected Israeli strike in Syria’s ancient city of Palmyra killed at least 36 people and injured dozens, according to SANA.
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