By Suleiman Al-Khalidi
AMMAN (Reuters) – Syria’s army said on Monday that the country’s air defenses had intercepted “Israeli aggression” over the capital Damascus in the latest bombing of Iranian targets in the past two months.
State media did not provide details on what was hit by the Israeli air force. Israeli military planes flew over the Golan Heights to hit targets on the outskirts of the capital, according to a statement from the army, without naming casualties, but adding air defenses dropped most of the missiles.
“Our air defense continues the Israeli missile strikes over the capital’s air,” the Syrian army said in a statement.
A Syrian military infiltrator said the bombings hit an important army unit in the city of Kiswa, almost 14 km (8.7 miles) south of the capital, in a vast area where Iranian-backed militants has a dominant presence.
Witnesses have heard huge explosions on the southern edge of Damascus, an area where militants backed by Iran are entrenched, residents said.
Israel’s military did not immediately comment on the latest strike, but its senior military officials acknowledged the escalating attacks in Syria to end Tehran’s entrenched military presence in Syria.
The chief of staff of the Israeli army, Aviv Kochavi, said late last year that his country’s missile attacks “slowed down the fortification of Iran in Syria” and in 2020 hit more than 500 targets.
Western intelligence sources say that Iran’s military influence has expanded in Syria over the past few years, which Israel has had to step up to prevent its arch-enemy from establishing a major military foothold along its border.
Iran’s proxy militias, led by Lebanon’s Hezbollah, are now hovering over vast areas in eastern, southern and northwestern Syria, as well as several suburbs around Damascus. They also control Lebanese-Syrian border areas.
Israel, which has held some of its biggest strikes to date in Syria over the past two months, has focused on Al Bukamal, the Syrian city that controls border control on the Baghdad-Damascus highway.
The broadening of the military campaign was part of a so-called “campaign within wars”, which was tacitly approved by the United States according to Israeli generals and local information sources.
Operations aimed at preventing Tehran from changing the balance of power in Syria in its favor have gradually eroded Iran’s expanded military might without inciting a major increase in hostilities, local information sources say.
(Reporting by Suleiman Al-Khalidi; Additional reporting by Kinda Makieh; Editing by Peter Cooney, Jacqueline Wong and Gerry Doyle)