Wednesday, January 15, 2020

Israeli Airstrike On T-4 Kills 3 Militia, Casualties Expected To Increase


Three pro-Iranian militia fighters killed in strike on T4




At least three members of a pro-Iranian militia were killed in alleged Israeli airstrikes on the T-4 military airbase in Syria’s Homs province in western Syria on Tuesday night.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), the number of casualties in the strikes is expected to increase due to the number of wounded. SOHR reported that the strikes destroyed an ammunition depot as well as military vehicles and a building under construction at the base.
The alleged Israeli airstrikes marked the first time this year that IAF jets carried out airstrikes on military targets belonging to Iran west of Syria’s Deir Ezzor, coming several hours after two Syrian Air Force cargo flights from Tehran landed at the base.

With a large presence of Iranian-backed troops in the area, both civilian and cargo airlines are used by the IRGC as a front for military transport flights bringing in soldiers and weaponry to bolster Iran’s military presence in Syria.
The Syrian Ministry of Defense said Tuesday night that IAF jets entered Syria from Tanf, in southeastern Homs, where the United States has a base near the Iraqi-Jordanian border. Simultaneously, explosions were heard in the Deir Ezzor area of eastern Syria near sites belonging to Syrian regime forces.

The strikes also come several hours after the Israeli army’s annual intel assessment was released and noted that the targeted assassination of Iran’s Quds Force Commander Qasem Soleimani provides a significant opportunity to counter Tehran’s growing aggressiveness in the region.
Israeli officials have repeatedly voiced concerns over the growing Iranian presence on its borders and the smuggling of sophisticated weaponry to Hezbollah from Tehran to Lebanon via Syria, stressing that both are redlines for the Jewish state.

Israel is accused of being behind dozens of airstrikes targeting T-4, including one in June that is believed to have destroyed an advanced weapons system which had been transported from Iran a day earlier.

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