Israeli air strikes on Wednesday night struck an estimated 20 targets across Syria, including Iranian Quds Force bases, Shia militias, and Assad regime assets, in retaliation for Iranian missile fire the previous day at the Golan Heights. Four rockets were fired at the Golan Heights and northern Galilee regions of Israel from Syria.
The Israeli strikes killed between 10 and 20 fighters, most of them Iranians, according to an Israeli official.
They took place in and to the southwest of Damascus. An additional ten Syrian military air defence batteries were also hit after firing at Israeli aircraft.
Since the beginning of the Syrian civil war in 2011, Israel has underlined that it would retaliate to any violation of Israeli sovereignty — whether in the form of accidental spillover fire from fighting on the Syrian Golan Heights or the infiltration of drones into Israeli airspace.
Similar Israeli strikes were launched inside Syria in May 2018, January 2019 and in September in response to Iranian-backed attacks on Israel emanating from Syria.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement that Israel has: “Made it clear that whoever hits us – we will hurt him….We will continue to vigorously maintain the security of Israel”.
