Israel conducts "large-scale" strikes in Syria

Israeli warplanes bombed multiple Iranian and Syrian military targets in Syria during the night of Tuesday 19 to Wednesday, 20 November. These "large-scale" strikes were made "in response" to rocket fire the day before, an Israeli spokesman said.

These strikes reportedly killed 23 people including 16 foreign fighters, according to a report from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH), which has a vast network of sources in the country at war.

During our strike of Iranian & Syrian terror targets, a Syrian air defense missile was fired despite clear warnings to refrain from such fire. As a result, Syrian aerial defense batteries were destroyed.

"Whoever strikes us will hit him!" That's what we did tonight against Syrian military targets and Iranian Al-Quds forces in Syria, "said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, currently in intense dealings to stay in power.

A "dozen military targets"

According to the army, Israeli fighter planes hit a "dozen military targets" in Syria, including warehouses and military command centers.

"It was brief and very intense," Israeli army spokesman Jonathan Conricus told AFP. "The main target was the 'glass building'" in the "military perimeter of Damascus International Airport", he said.

"This is the main building used by the Revolutionary Guards (...) to coordinate the transport of military equipment from Iran to Syria and beyond," added the official.

"All this is very bad," said Mikhail Bogdanov, deputy foreign minister of Russia, Syria's allied powerhouse. The Israeli raid "totally contradicts international law," he said.

Last week, the Israeli army carried out an operation against Islamic Jihad in Gaza, a Palestinian enclave of two million inhabitants.

A strike in Damascus had targeted the house of a figure from this Palestinian armed group, Akram Ajouri. The coup, attributed by Syria to Israel - which had not commented - had killed two, including the son of Akram Ajouri, considered a tenor of the political bureau of Islamic Jihad.

In the aftermath of the Gaza operation against commander Baha Abu al-Ata, the Islamic Jihad responded by launching some 450 rockets to Israel, according to the army. The Jewish state has increased the number of strikes against "targets" of Islamic Jihad in Gaza.

About two days after the clashes began, eight members of a Palestinian family - one man, two women and five children - were killed in a strike in Deir al-Balah, in the south of the enclave.

In total, these Israeli strikes on Gaza left 34 dead and 110 wounded, according to the local health ministry.