The Syrian Defense Ministry also confirmed the attacks on Sunday night. Israel carried out an airstrike from the Mediterranean around 11:35 p.m. on Saturday, the ministry said in a statement. He targeted the international airport in Aleppo, “caused material damage there and put it out of operation.” Syrian state television had previously reported an “Israeli attack on Aleppo international airport.”
Saturday’s attacks came just hours after the airport reopened following Israeli airstrikes on Thursday, according to the Syrian Observatory. The airport has now stopped its air traffic again. The Observatory obtains its information from a network of various sources in Syria. The organization’s information is often difficult to verify independently.
According to official Syrian media reports, the airports in the Syrian capital Damascus and the city of Aleppo were attacked by Israel on Thursday.
The Israeli army had previously commented on the attacks – something it rarely does. After an air alarm in the towns of Avnei Eitan and Alma on the annexed Golan Heights, the army is attacking targets in Syria from which the shelling came, an army spokesman said on Saturday evening. In addition, reports of an incursion from Lebanon by air are being investigated.
Since the surprise attack on southern Israel by the radical Islamic Palestinian organization Hamas, which rules in the Gaza Strip, a week ago, the army has also been on high alert on its northern border with Lebanon and on the border with Syria. Army spokesman Daniel Hagari emphasized on Saturday evening that Israel had massed numerous soldiers on its northern border. “Anyone who crosses the border to get into Israel will die,” he warned.
The radical Islamic Palestinian organization Hamas attacked Israel a week ago with thousands of rockets and hundreds of fighters. The militants carried out bloodbaths in several towns in southern Israel, killing more than 1,300 people in total. Around 120 people were kidnapped as hostages in the Gaza Strip.
Since the start of the Syrian war in 2011, Israel has carried out hundreds of airstrikes on targets in Syria, targeting positions belonging to government forces as well as the Hezbollah militia and other Iranian-backed groups. Israel’s government rarely confirms individual operations, but has repeatedly said it will not tolerate an expansion of Iranian influence in Syria.
Since the major Hamas attack, the situation in the border area between Israel and its northern neighbors Syria and Lebanon has been particularly tense. Hamas receives military and financial support from Iran, among others. Tehran is also considered Syria’s leader Bashar al-Assad’s most important ally in the region. The Iranian leadership celebrated the Hamas attack a week ago as a “success.” However, Iran denied direct involvement in the attack.
