Israel attacks Iranian targets in Syria as shadow war heats up between the two adversaries: report

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JERUSALEM, Israel – Israel’s military reportedly launched an air strike Sunday in a Damascus neighborhood near an Iranian military installation – the latest attack in the Jewish state’s “shadow war” against Iran.

The Syrian opposition news outlet Orient News claimed the military strikes targeted Iranian regime officials in the central Damascus neighborhood of Kafar Sousah.

Israeli intelligence and security expert, Brig. Gen. (Res.) Yossi Kuperwasser, now a senior researcher at the Israeli Defense Security Forum, told Fox News Digital that “Israel continues to actively undermine and hamper Iranian efforts to supply the [Bashar] Assad regime [in Syria] and Hezbollah with advanced weaponry.”

Kuperwasser added, “According to the Information I have, some of the casualties in Damascus were a direct result of a Syrian air defense missile that struck a building. This is not the first time that unprofessional Syrian air defense fire causes unwanted casualties.”

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In this photo released by the Syrian official news agency SANA, people view the damage in residential neighborhood after an early morning Israeli airstrike in Damascus, Syria, Sunday, Feb. 19, 2023. (AP)

Two Syrian military sources, speaking anonymously because they were not authorized to speak to the press, told Reuters that stray anti-aircraft rockets fired in response to the missiles hit the vicinity of the historic citadel of Damascus.

Tehran’s military ally the Syrian Army said five people were killed after an Israeli rocket strike hit a building in the Kafar Sousah neighborhood of Central Damascus.

Media reports revealed in 2015 that Israeli spy agencies and the CIA reportedly assassinated the Iranian-backed global terrorist Imad Mughniyeh in a 2008 car bombing in Kafar Sousah. Mughniyeh oversaw terrorist operations for Iran’s chief strategic ally, the Lebanon-based Hezbollah movement.

An Israeli military spokesman declined to comment to Fox News Digital on the alleged Israeli air strike on Sunday.

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Syrian air defense batteries respond to what Syrian state media said were Israeli missiles targeting Damascus on Jan. 21, 2019. (Getty)

In addition to the five deaths, the Syrian regime-controlled Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) reported that 15 people were injured and showed a picture of a destroyed building on its Twitter feed.

SANA reported that Syria’s Foreign Ministry said Sunday it “expects the United Nations Secretariat and Security Council to condemn Israeli aggression and crimes, take the necessary measures to deter them, hold them accountable, punish their perpetrators and ensure they do not recur.”

The reported Israeli Air Force strike took place on the same day that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu blamed Tehran for an attack on an Israeli-owned vessel in the Persian Gulf. “Last week Iran attacked an oil tanker in the Persian Gulf and harmed the international freedom and navigation,” Netanyahu said at a weekly cabinet meeting. 

Regional defense and security sources have said the suspected assault was carried out by Iran, which did not comment on the incident.

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Esmail Qaani, commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ (IRGC) Quds Force, speaks in Tehran on Dec.20, 2022. (Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

While Israel’s government has mostly stayed quiet on the military strikes, Syria has intensified its alliance with Iran’s regime since a revolt unfolded in the country in 2011 against the one-man, one-party rule of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

For almost a decade, Israel has been carrying out strikes against suspected Iranian-sponsored weapons transfers and personnel deployments in next-door Syria. Israeli officials have acknowledged some hundreds of military interventions targeting Iranian assets in Syria while staying quiet on other alleged strikes.

Iran has expanded its military and intelligence presence in Syria over the years and has a foothold in most state-controlled areas, with thousands of members of militias and local paramilitary groups under its command, Western intelligence sources say.

Syria’s army claimed that Israel’s military launched missiles toward Damascus’s airport on Jan. 2, resulting in the deaths of two soldiers and injuring two additional people. The Jan. 2 attack was the last reported Israeli strike in the Syrian capital.

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The arrival of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander (IRGC), Esmail Qaani, in Syria after the earthquake-ravaged parts of Syria and Turkey put Israel’s security apparatus on notice. Video footage circulated by social-media outlets linked to the IRGC showed Qaani in Aleppo, Syria. Iranian media denied Qaani was injured or killed in Sunday’s air strikes. 

Israel and its Sunni allies like Jordan, Egypt, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates have long expressed concerns about the Iranian regime plan to establish a so-called “Shiite crescent” that stretches from Iran to Lebanon. 

Reuters contributed to this report.

Benjamin Weinthal reports on Israel, Iran, Syria, Turkey and Europe for Fox News Digital. Benjamin has contributed articles to The Wall Street Journal, The Jerusalem Post, Foreign Policy, Haaretz, Forbes and The New York Post. You can follow Benjamin on Twitter @BenWeinthal.