The outskirts of the capital Damascus witnessed explosions early this morning, resulting from a bombing that Israel was accused of carrying out, with no information on the extent of the damage caused.
The official Syrian news agency (SANA) reported that Israeli aircraft raided at dawn today, Thursday, May 9, from the direction of the occupied Syrian Golan, targeting a building in the countryside of Damascus, without specifying the location or nature of the target.
It added, quoting an unnamed military source, that air defense systems confronted the attack and shot down some missiles, while others hit their targets causing material damage.
For its part, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (based in London) stated that Israeli airstrikes targeted a headquarters for the Iraqi al-Nujaba Movement in the Sayyida Zainab area south of Damascus.
While Israel has not commented on the incident and has not announced responsibility for the bombing, Israeli media including Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper merely relayed the news of the bombing from Syrian official media.
The attack comes less than a week after another similar one that resulted in injuries among regime forces near Damascus.
On May 3 of this year, the Ministry of Defense in the Syrian regime government stated that Israeli aircraft bombed from the direction of the occupied Syrian Golan a site in the vicinity of Damascus, which resulted in the wounding of eight soldiers and material damage.
Israel’s targets in Syria include infrastructure and headquarters for Iran-backed armed groups, and may be deep within Syrian territory, while it frequently responds to sources of gunfire from southern Syria.
The Israeli air strikes in Syria had calmed down after a rapid escalation of events began when Israel bombed an Iranian consular building in the Mezzeh district of the capital, Damascus, to which Iran responded about ten days later with a barrage of rockets and drones launched towards Israel, but they did not reach their destination.
Since the Iranian attack, Israeli attacks have ceased except for two attacks, one of which was an Israeli response to the same Iranian attack in southern Syria, and the other was a response to rocket fire from Syria near the capital, Damascus.
Iran periodically announces the deaths of its members and leaders on Syrian territory or reveals the identities of bodies of fighters killed earlier in Syria, and rarely mourns those it describes as “consultants” or leaders of this type.