Two hurt in Israeli airstrike outside Damascus: Syrian defense ministry

Two people were injured in an Israeli airstrike in the region surrounding Syria’s capital Damascus, the Syrian defense ministry said in a statement.

The strike targeted a residential building and also resulted in “some material damage,” the ministry added.

“The Israeli enemy launched an aerial attack from the occupied Syrian Golan, targeting a residential building on the outskirts of Damascus,” the Syrian state news agency SANA said, citing a military source.

“The attack left two civilians injured and caused material damage,” the agency added.

The head of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Rami Abdel Rahman, meanwhile told AFP “explosions were heard” near Damascus “after Israeli strikes on sites belonging to groups affiliated with Iran and Lebanon’s Hezbollah.”

The Sayyida Zeinab area targeted in the strikes is a stronghold of pro-Iran armed groups.

According to the Observatory, Hezbollah and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps have their Syrian headquarters in the area.

Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes targeting pro-Iran groups fighting alongside the forces of President Bashar al-Assad in the country’s 13-year civil war.

On Tuesday, strikes in Syria killed 16 pro-Iran fighters including an Iranian Revolutionary Guard, the Observatory said.

And earlier this month, an Israeli strike reportedly killed an Iranian Revolutionary Guard and two other people in Banias on Syria’s Mediterranean coast.

The Israeli army previously said it had hit about 4,500 Hezbollah targets in Lebanon and Syria over the past five months.

Israel rarely comments on individual strikes but has repeatedly said it will not allow Iran to expand its presence in Syria.