Syrian Ministry Says Israel Strikes Damascus Area

Smoke billows from buildings near Damas after an Israeli attack during the night of July 1, 2019. © Youssef Karwashan, AFP (archives)
Smoke billows from buildings near Damas after an Israeli attack during the night of July 1, 2019. © Youssef Karwashan, AFP (archives)
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Syrian Ministry Says Israel Strikes Damascus Area

Smoke billows from buildings near Damas after an Israeli attack during the night of July 1, 2019. © Youssef Karwashan, AFP (archives)
Smoke billows from buildings near Damas after an Israeli attack during the night of July 1, 2019. © Youssef Karwashan, AFP (archives)

Israel carried out strikes Wednesday near Damascus, Syria's defense ministry said, the latest reported attack amid soaring regional tensions since the start of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.

"The Israeli enemy launched airstrikes from the direction of the occupied Syrian Golan, targeting a number of sites in the Damascus countryside," the ministry said in a statement.

"Our air defenses responded to the aggression's missiles and shot down most of them," it added.

An AFP correspondent in the Syrian capital heard explosions followed by the sirens of ambulances.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said the Israeli strikes killed two Syrian pro-Hezbollah fighters and had targeted "sites where Iran-backed groups including Lebanon's Hezbollah are based" in two locations near Damascus.

When asked about the strikes, the Israeli army told AFP: "We do not comment on reports in the foreign media."

On Sunday, an Israeli strike on a truck in Syria near the Lebanese border killed two Hezbollah members, the Observatory had said, with a source close to Hezbollah later confirming the deaths.

Since Syria's civil war began in 2011, Israel has launched hundreds of airstrikes against its northern neighbour, primarily targeting pro-Iran forces, among them Lebanese Hamas ally Hezbollah and the Syrian army.

The strikes have multiplied during the almost five-month war between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

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



Israel Orders Evacuation of Area Designated as Humanitarian Zone in Gaza

 A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
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Israel Orders Evacuation of Area Designated as Humanitarian Zone in Gaza

 A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)

Israel’s military ordered the evacuation Saturday of a crowded part of Gaza designated as a humanitarian zone, saying it is planning an operation against Hamas militants in Khan Younis, including parts of Muwasi, a makeshift tent camp where thousands are seeking refuge.

The order comes in response to rocket fire that Israel says originates from the area. It's the second evacuation issued in a week in an area designated for Palestinians fleeing other parts of Gaza. Many Palestinians have been uprooted multiple times in search of safety during Israel's punishing air and ground campaign.

On Monday, after the evacuation order, multiple Israeli airstrikes hit around Khan Younis, killing at least 70 people, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, citing figures from Nasser Hospital.

The area is part of a 60-square-kilometer (roughly 20-square-mile) “humanitarian zone” to which Israel has been telling Palestinians to flee to throughout the war. Much of the area is blanketed with tent camps that lack sanitation and medical facilities and have limited access to aid, United Nations and humanitarian groups say. About 1.8 million Palestinians are sheltering there, according to Israel's estimates. That's more than half Gaza’s pre-war population of 2.3 million.

The war in Gaza has killed more than 39,100 Palestinians, according to the territory’s Health Ministry, which doesn’t distinguish between combatants and civilians in its count. The UN estimated in February that some 17,000 children in the territory are now unaccompanied, and the number is likely to have grown since.

The war began with an assault by Hamas fighters on southern Israel on Oct. 7 that killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and took about 250 hostages. About 115 are still in Gaza, about a third of them believed to be dead, according to Israeli authorities.