The Iranian Embassy in the Syrian capital of Damascus has come under Israeli missile attack, killing at least six people including an Iranian commander.
One of the dead includes Brigadier General Mohammed Reza Zahedi, a senior commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Quds Force in Syria and Lebanon.
Syria’s official news agency, SANA, said the strikes were carried out by “the Israeli enemy” and targeted the Mezzeh neighborhood in Damascus on Monday afternoon.
“At approximately 00:17 p.m. today, the Israeli enemy launched an air aggression from the direction of the occupied Syrian Golan, targeting the Iranian consulate building in Damascus,” SANA said, citing a military source as saying.
“Our air defense media responded to the aggression’s missiles and shot down some of them. The aggression led to the destruction of the entire building and the martyrdom and injury of everyone inside, and work is underway to recover the bodies.”
Sana, citing one of its correspondents, said the Israeli aggression also caused major destruction to “neighbouring buildings.”
Iran’s Ambassador to Damascus Hossein Akbari confirmed the reports of the Israeli attack and said the regime had targeted the consular building with six missiles.
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Akbari said five to seven people were martyred in the Israeli aggression, including a number of Iranian advisers who were in the building. Two police officers were also among those killed in the attack.
“We will give a decisive response to this action,” he said. “This regime has no respect for international laws,” the ambassador added. “We will support the resistant nation [of Palestine] and have no fear of the criminality of this regime.”
Iranian sources added that members of the Iranian diplomatic mission in Damascus, including the ambassador, are unharmed, but the consulate building was destroyed.
Meanwhile, Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad has visited Iran’s Embassy following the missile attack.
Condemning the Israeli aggression, Mekdad said, “The Israeli occupation entity will not be able to influence the relations between Iran and Syria.”
Israeli Army Radio, without admitting responsibility for the strike, said that the Iranian Embassy wasn’t targeted, but a nearby building serving as IRGC military headquarters,
Israel, which has yet to comment on the attack, has carried out regular attacks on Iranian targets inside Syria over recent years.
The attack came amid heightened tensions in the region in the wake of the Israeli onslaught on the Gaza Strip, which has killed more than 32,800 Palestinians and spawned the worst humanitarian crisis.
Earlier, there were reports about the presence of senior Palestinian leaders in the targeted building, including Islamic Jihad leader Ziad al-Nakhaleh.
Nakhaleh and Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh were both in Tehran earlier this week where they held talks with senior Iranian leadership.
