DAMASCUS - At least five people have been killed in a missile strike on a building in Damascus, Iran’s English-language state media outlet Press TV reported Saturday evening.
This follows reports earlier Saturday that four Iranian military advisers and several members of Syrian forces had been killed in what was deemed an Israeli missile strike, according to Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency, which cited the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
Syrian state TV, which also accused Israel of the attack, said earlier that several people were killed and injured in Saturday’s missile strike in the Mazzeh neighborhood, home to several diplomatic missions including the Iranian embassy.
The IRGC named the four military members as Hojatollah Omidvar, Ali Aghazadeh, Hossein Mohammadi and Saeed Karimi. “The Supreme Leader and Commander in Chief offered condolences and congratulations to the families of the great martyrs and to the fighters and commanders of the Islamic resistance front,” Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency reported, citing the IRGC.
Syrian civil defense teams were searching for people they believe are trapped under the rubble, state TV reported, and that a number of surrounding buildings and nearby vehicles were also damaged in the strike. The Israel Defense Forces declined to comment on the strike, telling CNN on Saturday: “We do not comment on foreign reports.”
US PERSONNEL INJURED IN ATTACK ON AL-ASAD AIR BASE IN IRAQ, US OFFICIAL SAYS
US personnel were injured in an attack on Al-Asad Air Base in Iraq, a US official says. It was not immediately clear how many were injured or what their condition was. Sharhabil al-Obaidi, the mayor of al-Baghdadi in Anbar province, told CNN on Saturday that the Al-Asad Air Base was targeted with multiple rockets, which were intercepted by air defenses. The rockets were launched from northeast of the al-Baghdadi area, he said.
The Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an Iran-backed militia group, claimed responsibility for the missile attack.
The group emphasized in a statement Saturday its commitment to resisting American “occupation forces” in the region and cited the attack as a response to what they referred to as the “Zionist entity’s massacres” against the Palestinian people in Gaza.
As of Thursday, US and coalition forces have come under attack more than 143 times in Iraq and Syria since October 7, as Iranian-backed Shia militias have launched repeated drone and rocket attacks.
US forces in Iraq and Syria operate as part of the coalition to defeat ISIS.
In a statement, the UN secretary-general’s special representative for Iraq warned that the region is at a “critical juncture” stemming from the war in Gaza that risks drawing Iraq further into the conflict.
“Despite the Government’s efforts to prevent the escalation of tensions, continued attacks - originating from within and outside of Iraq’s borders - stand to undo the hard-won stability of the country and the achievements it has made in recent years,” the statement said.
Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on Saturday strongly condemned the deaths of five members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in a suspected Israeli missile strike on the Syrian capital of Damascus, according to Iranian state media Press TV.
Reacting to the strike — in what is the latest tit-for-tat escalation of hostilities that further risks spiraling into a wider regional conflict — Raisi vowed that Iran would retaliate, saying such “cowardly” acts will not go unanswered.
Raisi also said the attack would be “another stain on the record of all governments who claim to be the advocates of human rights because it violated Syria’s airspace and trampled on human and international laws,” according to Iranian state media.
The Syrian Ministry of Defense claimed Israel “launched an air attack from the Golan Heights at 10:20 a.m. local time that targeted a residential building in the Mazzeh neighborhood in Damascus.” In a statement, the ministry said its defenses managed to intercept and shoot “down a number of the enemy’s missiles.”
The Israeli military declined to comment on the Iranian and Syrian allegations that they were behind the attack. An Israel Defense Forces spokesperson told CNN: “We do not comment on foreign reports.”
IRAN’S RAISI VOWS TO RETALIATE
Two people were killed after an Israeli airstrike on Saturday hit a vehicle in Lebanon in the town of al-Bazouriya near the border, the Lebanese state-run National News Agency (NNA) reported.
A separate drone strike hit a house in Marwahin, Lebanon, that had previously been targeted by Israel, according to NNA. The agency also said two Israeli airstrikes hit different locations in and around al-Adisa while Israeli artillery hit towns on the eastern and western sectors of the border.
Hezbollah said it launched three attacks on Israeli military sites on Saturday, targeting soldiers’ gatherings near the Zareit barracks, al-Dhuhaira and Honein.
