Syria says ‘enemy’ missiles struck military bases in Hama, Aleppo

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The Syrian army has claimed that missiles struck several military bases in the Hama and Aleppo countryside on Sunday in what it said was a new “act of aggression” by its enemies, according to state television.

State-run TV said the rocket attack took place at 10:30 pm.

“Syria is being subjected to a new wave of aggression as a number of military bases in rural Hama and Aleppo were hit by enemy rockets,” an army source was quoted as saying, without elaboration.

Israel has previously targeted Iranian-backed militia bases in Syria, namely striking convoys of weapons belonging to the Lebanese Shia Hezbollah group. Israel views the Lebanese Hezbollah, which is fighting alongside Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, as the greatest threat to its borders.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a well-known war monitor, said that Sunday’s strikes hit an arms depot and killed 26 people. The victims were allegedly mostly Iranian and Iraqi fighters.

One of the targeted locations was an army base near the city of Hama known as Brigade 47, widely known as a recruitment center for Iranian-backed Shia militias who fight alongside the Syrian government, an opposition source told Reuters.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu earlier this month mentioned that his country would continue “to move against Iran in Syria.”

In April, the New York Times quoted an unnamed Israeli military source that claimed Israel had hit a Syrian airbase which Iran was using. Iranian Tasnim news agency at the time said seven Iranian personnel were killed in the strike.

The missile attack on the airbase alarmed Tehran, which warned it would respond.

Israel has repeatedly raised the alarm against Iran’s expansion in the region. Its influence stretches from Iraq to Lebanon, where Israel says Iran supplies the Hezbollah with weapons and ammunition.

The Lebanese Hezbollah and other Iranian-backed militias have a sizeable military presence in Syria, including central and eastern territories near the border with Iraq.

Editing by Nadia Riva