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.



Toll in Syria Opposition-army Fighting Rises to 242

Fighters from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) ride in military vehicles in the eastern outskirts of the town of Atarib, in Syria's northern province of Aleppo on November 27, 2024, during clashes with the Syrian army. (Photo by Abdulaziz KETAZ / AFP)
Fighters from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) ride in military vehicles in the eastern outskirts of the town of Atarib, in Syria's northern province of Aleppo on November 27, 2024, during clashes with the Syrian army. (Photo by Abdulaziz KETAZ / AFP)
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Toll in Syria Opposition-army Fighting Rises to 242

Fighters from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) ride in military vehicles in the eastern outskirts of the town of Atarib, in Syria's northern province of Aleppo on November 27, 2024, during clashes with the Syrian army. (Photo by Abdulaziz KETAZ / AFP)
Fighters from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) ride in military vehicles in the eastern outskirts of the town of Atarib, in Syria's northern province of Aleppo on November 27, 2024, during clashes with the Syrian army. (Photo by Abdulaziz KETAZ / AFP)

More than 240 people, mostly combatants, were killed as intense fighting approached Syria's northern Aleppo city after the opposition launched a major offensive on government-held areas this week, a monitor said Friday.
On Wednesday, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and allied Turkish-backed factions launched an attack on government-held areas in the northwest, triggering the fiercest fighting since 2020, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Rami Abdel Rahman, who heads the Observatory, said fighting reached two kilometers (1.2 miles) from the main northern city of Aleppo, where the group’s artillery shelling on student housing killed four civilians, according to state media.
"The combatants' death toll in the ongoing... operation in the Idlib and Aleppo countrysides has risen to 218," since Wednesday, said the British-based monitor with a network of sources inside Syria.
In addition to the fighters, it said 24 civilians were killed.
Syrian ally Russia launched air strikes that killed 19 civilians on Thursday, while another civilian had been killed in Syrian army shelling a day earlier, said the Observatory which on Thursday had reported an overall toll of about 200 dead, including the civilians.