SOHR: Iran Condemns Israeli Attacks in Syria Injures Civilians

Israeli airstrikes wounded two civilians on Saturday (2/7) in the heart Syrian government the war-torn country’s west coast. The targeted area was previously used as a ranch.

“Enemies of Israel carried out air strikes,” after dawn near the town of Al-Hamidiyah, the defense ministry said. Syria identified the affected site as a poultry farm without elaborating.

The attack was carried out from the Mediterranean Sea, west of the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli. “This left two civilians injured, including a woman,” it said in a statement.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said the previously attacked facilities were used to raise livestock. But now it is being used by the Lebanese Shiite militant movement Hezbollah, an ally of the Syrian government. The Israeli army told AFP on Saturday it did not comment on reports in foreign media.

Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian of Iran, also a staunch ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, condemned the Israeli attack. “With its attacks, the Zionist entity is trying to portray Damascus as an unsafe city to hinder the return of Syrian refugees,” he said on Saturday during a visit to the Syrian capital.

Video footage by Syria’s official news agency SANA shows debris at what is said to be the location of the targeted facility. People are seen checking the location. You can see chunks of crushed concrete and iron lying on the ground in the middle of the field. Al-Hamidiyah lies south of Tartus, a Syrian government stronghold and home to a naval port used by Russia, whose armed forces have backed Assad.

Since civil war broke out in Syria in 2011, Israel has carried out hundreds of air strikes against its northern neighbour. The strikes targeted Syrian government forces as well as Iranian-backed allied forces and Hezbollah fighters.

Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said Saturday’s attack targeted a warehouse previously used to raise animals and used by the Lebanese Hezbollah group to transport weapons. Syrian air defense systems appear not to have been deployed, said the UK-based monitor, which has an extensive source network in Syria.

Last month, an Israeli attack on Damascus International Airport left its runway unusable for weeks. In addition to the severe damage done to civilian and military runways, monitors said the attack targeted a nearby warehouse used as an arms depot by Iran and Hezbollah. The Syrian war has claimed the lives of nearly half a million people and forced about half of the country’s pre-war population to flee their homes.