Israeli fighter jets have carried out missile attacks against two targets inside Syria close to the highway connecting the capital Damascus, to the Lebanese capital Beirut.
Syria’s state television reported on Wednesday that the Israeli air force had fired two missiles from the Lebanese airspace towards an area near Damascus. It said the attack had fallen short of causing any casualties.
Syria’s official news agency SANA cite an unnamed military source as saying that the missiles fell on the Saboura area west of Damascus.
The source said the Israeli assault was an attempt to “divert attention away from the successes of” government forces on the battleground against Takfiri militants.
Meanwhile, Rai al-Youm, an Arab world digital news and opinion website, said one of the strikes, it said, hit a Syrian army's arms depot, while another targeted a number of trucks thought to be carrying weapons and military equipment.
Al-Masdar News, a pan-Arab news and commentary website based in Boston, also said the warplane had fired long-range ‘Popeye’ missiles at the Saboura district,
The air-to-surface missiles have been developed by the Israeli military itself.
“The jet did not penetrate Syrian airspace but did allegedly breach Lebanese airspace in order to come within striking range of its designated target,” it reported.
Israel is widely viewed as a staunch supporter of the Takfiri terrorists operating against the Damascus government.
The regime regularly targets the Syrian side of the Golan Heights, parts of which it has occupied since 1967.
Tel Aviv also provides treatment to anti-Syria Takfiri terrorists who sustain injuries on the battlefield against the Syrian army.
In the past, Israeli jets have time and again carried out sorties inside the Syrian territory under various pretexts.
Back in May, an Israeli strike against Damascus claimed the life of Mustafa Badreddine, a senior Hezbollah commander.
Lebanon’s Hezbollah resistance movement, which fought off two Israeli wars in 2006 and 2008 at home, has been successfully helping Syria to defend itself in the face of terrorists and to prevent the spillover of the crisis into Lebanon.