Israeli Strike on Iran's Consulate in Syria Killed 2 Generals and Other Officers

An Israeli airstrike that demolished Iran’s consulate in Syria on Monday killed two Iranian generals and five officers, according to Iranian officials. The strike appeared to signify an escalation of Israel’s targeting of military officials from Iran, which supports militant groups fighting Israel in Gaza, and along its border with Lebanon.
Since the war in Gaza began nearly six months ago, clashes have increased between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah militants based in Lebanon. Hamas, which rules Gaza and attacked Israel on Oct. 7, is also backed by Iran.
Israel, which rarely acknowledges strikes against Iranian targets, said it had no comment on the latest attack in Syria, although a military spokesman blamed Iran for a drone attack early Monday against a naval base in southern Israel.
Israel has grown increasingly impatient with the daily exchanges of fire with Hezbollah, which have escalated in recent days, and warned of the possibility of a full-fledged war. Iranian-backed Houthi groups in Yemen have also been launching long-range missiles toward Israel, including on Monday.
The airstrike in Syria killed Gen. Mohammad Reza Zahedi, who led the elite Quds Force in Lebanon and Syria until 2016, according to Iran's Revolutionary Guard. It also killed Zahedi's deputy, Gen Mohammad Hadi Hajriahimi, and five other officers.
A member of Hezbollah, Hussein Youssef, also was killed in the attack, an official with the militant group told The Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity in line with the group's rules. Hezbollah has not publicly announced the death.
Hezbollah offered condolences to Iran for Zahedi's death and called Israel “foolish when it believes that liquidating the leaders can stop the roaring tide of the people's resistance.” It added in its statement that the killing “will not pass without the enemy receiving punishment and revenge.”
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which is based in Britain, said two Syrians also were killed.
Two police officers who guarded the consulate were among those wounded, and first responders were still searching for bodies under the rubble.
While Iran's consular building was leveled in the attack, according to Syria's state news agency, its main embassy building remained intact. Still, the Iranian ambassador's residence was inside the consular building.
Iran's ambassador, Hossein Akbari, vowed revenge for the strike “at the same magnitude and harshness.”
Hamas and Islamic Jihad — another Palestinian militant group backed by Iran — accused Israel of seeking to widen the conflict in Gaza.
Experts said there was no doubt that Iran would retaliate. The strike in Syria was a “major escalation,” Charles Lister, a Syria expert at the Middle East Institute in Washington, said on the social media platform X.
A spokesman for Iran's foreign ministry, Nasser Kanaani, called on other countries to condemn the strike.
Israel has attacked scores of Iranian-linked targets in Syria over the years with the apparent intent of disrupting arms transfers and other cooperation with Hezbollah. which has sent thousands of fighters to support Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces.
An Israeli airstrike in a Damascus neighborhood in December killed a longtime Iranian Revolutionary Guard adviser to Syria, Seyed Razi Mousavi.
A similar strike on a building in Damascus in January killed at least five Iranian advisers. Last week, an Iranian adviser was killed in airstrikes over the eastern Syrian province of Deir el-Zour, near the Iraqi border.
The chief spokesman for Israel’s army, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, said a Monday drone attack on a naval base in southern Israel was “directed by Iran” and caused no injuries.
Early on Tuesday, the Israeli military said some kind of weapon fired from Syria toward Israel crashed before reaching its intended target.

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.

Israeli Strike on Iran's Consulate in Syria Killed 2 Generals and Other Officers