Israel Attacks Syria's Central Region and Baniyas City

A handout picture released by the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) on May 29, 2024 shows damage caused inside an apartment in the coastal city of Baniyas, following what Syria's defense ministry said was an Israeli air strike. (Photo by SANA / AFP)
A handout picture released by the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) on May 29, 2024 shows damage caused inside an apartment in the coastal city of Baniyas, following what Syria's defense ministry said was an Israeli air strike. (Photo by SANA / AFP)
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Israel Attacks Syria's Central Region and Baniyas City

A handout picture released by the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) on May 29, 2024 shows damage caused inside an apartment in the coastal city of Baniyas, following what Syria's defense ministry said was an Israeli air strike. (Photo by SANA / AFP)
A handout picture released by the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) on May 29, 2024 shows damage caused inside an apartment in the coastal city of Baniyas, following what Syria's defense ministry said was an Israeli air strike. (Photo by SANA / AFP)

Israel launched air attacks on Syria's central region as well as the coastal city of Baniyas, killing a child and injuring ten civilians, Syrian state media said on Wednesday citing a military source.
"At approximately 19:30 pm, the Israeli enemy launched an air aggression from the direction of Lebanese territory, targeting a site in the central region and a residential building in Baniyas ... leading to the death of a girl, the injury of ten civilians," the source was quoted as saying.
Syrian state media reported earlier on Wednesday that the country's air defenses had intercepted "hostile targets" over Homs, without giving further details.
There was no immediate word on the incidents from Israel, which typically does not comment on specific reports of strikes in Syria, said Reuters.
For years Israel has been carrying out attacks against what it has described as Iran-linked targets in Syria, where Tehran's influence has grown since it began supporting President Bashar al-Assad in the civil war that started in 2011.
Reported Israeli strikes on Syria have intensified sharply since the start of the war in Gaza last October.
In April, Iran retaliated by firing missiles at Israel after a presumed Israeli strike that destroyed a building in Iran's embassy compound in Damascus and killed several Iranian officers including a top general.



WHO Sends Over 1 Mln Polio Vaccines to Gaza to Protect Children 

Displaced Palestinians, who fled their houses due to Israeli strikes, look out from a window as they take shelter, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 24, 2024. (Reuters)
Displaced Palestinians, who fled their houses due to Israeli strikes, look out from a window as they take shelter, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 24, 2024. (Reuters)
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WHO Sends Over 1 Mln Polio Vaccines to Gaza to Protect Children 

Displaced Palestinians, who fled their houses due to Israeli strikes, look out from a window as they take shelter, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 24, 2024. (Reuters)
Displaced Palestinians, who fled their houses due to Israeli strikes, look out from a window as they take shelter, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 24, 2024. (Reuters)

The World Health Organization is sending more than one million polio vaccines to Gaza to be administered over the coming weeks to prevent children being infected after the virus was detected in sewage samples, its chief said on Friday.

"While no cases of polio have been recorded yet, without immediate action, it is just a matter of time before it reaches the thousands of children who have been left unprotected," Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in an opinion piece in Britain's The Guardian newspaper.

He wrote that children under five were most at risk from the viral disease, and especially infants under two since normal vaccination campaigns have been disrupted by more than nine months of conflict.

Poliomyelitis, which is spread mainly through the fecal-oral route, is a highly infectious virus that can invade the nervous system and cause paralysis. Cases of polio have declined by 99% worldwide since 1988 thanks to mass vaccination campaigns and efforts continue to eradicate it completely.

Israel's military said on Sunday it would start offering the polio vaccine to soldiers serving in the Gaza Strip after remnants of the virus were found in test samples in the enclave.

Besides polio, the UN reported last week a widespread increase in cases of Hepatitis A, dysentery and gastroenteritis as sanitary conditions deteriorate in Gaza, with sewage spilling into the streets near some camps for displaced people.