Iran is building an underground tunnel for weapons storage in Syria
On Wednesday, May 13, Fox News reported that Iran has resumed construction of an underground tunnel designed to hold arms at the Kataib Imam Ali group in Syria, about 5 km from the border with Iraq, learned BulgarianMilitary.com citing News.co.il.
These conclusions were made on the basis of images taken by the television station’s editors from the Israeli company ImageSat International, the operator of the Eros-B surveillance satellite.
The images cited by the TV channel were taken on May 12, and you can see bulldozers at the facility, whose width is about 4.5 meters.
ImageSat International experts believe that the tunnel can be used to shelter vehicles with modern weapons. The conclusion was made by comparing the facility under construction with similar tunnels that were built at a military base over the past nine months.
The construction on the territory of a military base has been known since last fall. On December 4, ImageSat International published images with a fortified underground tunnel about 120 meters long, up to 5 meters wide and about 4 meters deep. Specialists then said that the tunnel could be used to store Iranian missiles.
As we reported yesterday Iran relocated its military structures in Syria. “In recent days, Iran has intensified the redeployment of its militias to various parts of Syria,” the report said. According to the publication, we are talking about the metropolitan province of Damascus and eastern Deir Ez-Zor.
BulgarianMilitary.com recalls that on May 5 some Israeli afficials said that Iranian forces are pulling out of Syria and closing military bases there.
On the next day the former IDF intelligence chief Amos Yadlin said to a media briefing hosted by MediaCentral, that “the Iranians are not leaving. I am not buying this argument.”
On the evening of December 7, 2019, the Syrian and Iraqi media reported that unidentified aircraft attacked the positions of Iranian forces and pro-Iranian militias on the outskirts of Al-Bukamal. The London-based organization The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) on December 8 claimed five killed and significant damage. The authorities of Syria, Iraq or Iran did not make statements about this attack. However, there was no information that the specified tunnel was destroyed.
Fox News reports that in March of this year, one of the tunnels being built by Iran at a military base was destroyed by an air strike, after which, judging by aerial photographs, the construction was suspended. Recall that on March 11, 2020, unidentified UAVs attacked targets on the basis of the Shiite pro-Iranian group Kataib Imam Ali (Imam Ali Battalions) in the Al-Bukamal region in eastern Syria near the border with Iraq. SOHR reported 18 killed. Who struck this blow is unknown. SOHR did not rule out that the Israelis attacked. Iraqi and Lebanese media later said that the attack was carried out by the Americans.
On May 4, 2020, according to SOHR, the Israeli Air Force attacked a pro-Iranian police facility in the al-Mayadin desert (Dir al-Zur governorate), on the Syrian-Iraqi border, at least 14 Iranians and Iraqis were killed.
Source: Iran is building an underground tunnel for weapons storage in Syria