Israeli Airstrike in Damascus Results in Death of Syrian Spy Chief and 12 Guards

A strike on Damascus targeted the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ Syria spy chief and killed 13 people, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) confirmed it lost five members in the strike it blamed on Israel. The Syrian Observatory said the deaths included five Iranians, four Syrians, one Syrian civilian, two Lebanese, and one Iraqi national. It was also said the building targeted belonged to the IRGC and that the area is known to be a high-security zone. Damascus’s upscale Mazzeh neighbourhood is also home to a United Nations headquarters and embassies.
This strike was the second high-profile targeted assassination in Syria in less than a month.
Israel rarely comments on individual strikes targeting Syria but has repeatedly said it will not allow Iran to expand its presence there. Since 2011, Syria has endured a bloody conflict that has claimed more than half a million lives and displaced several million people.