Two people were killed and three others injured Monday in an Israeli strike targeting a car in the Mazze neighborhood of Damascus, home to the UN headquarters and embassies, the Syrian Defense Ministry said.
“Around 5:05 p.m. (2:05 p.m. GMT), the Israeli enemy carried out an air attack targeting a civilian car in the residential neighborhood of Mazzeh in Damascus, killing two civilians and wounding three.”indicated the ministry.
An AFP correspondent said a hotel was damaged and vehicles charred by the explosion which took place near the Ministry of Information and the UN headquarters.
For its part, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH) reported that the explosion had been “caused by a missile fired by an Israeli drone”.
He added that the missile targeted a non-Syrian man who was driving his car in this neighborhood, where a ceremony was being held in memory of Hamas leader Yahya Sinouar, killed by Israel in the Gaza Strip last week. .
On October 8, a violent Israeli airstrike on this same upscale neighborhood of the Syrian capital left 13 dead, including nine civilians, according to the OSDH.
According to the NGO, it had targeted a building frequented by members of Lebanese Hezbollah and the Revolutionary Guards, Iran’s ideological army.
Also in Mazzé, four people were killed a few days earlier in an Israeli raid, according to the NGO.
Among the dead was the son-in-law of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, himself killed in an Israeli airstrike on the southern suburbs of Beirut on September 27.
The wreckage of a car which exploded in Damascus, October 21, 2024 in Syria / Maher AL MOUNES / AFP
Since civil war broke out in Syria in 2011, Israel has carried out hundreds of raids on the country targeting the Syrian army and Tehran-backed groups, including Hezbollah, deployed in support of government forces.
Israeli authorities rarely comment on these strikes but say they will not allow Iran, Israel’s sworn enemy, to expand its presence in Syria.
Since Hezbollah entered into open conflict with Israel at the end of September, the pace of strikes has increased.
