Israeli airstrikes caused extensive damage in the Syrian port of Latakia on Tuesday, the second such attack in December against the strategic facility in the west of the country, Syrian state media said.
Since war broke out in Syria in 2011, Israel has carried out hundreds of airstrikes on its neighbor, targeting military positions as well as Iran-backed forces and fighters from the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah.
“At around 3:21 am, the Israeli enemy carried out an aerial attack with several missiles in the direction of the Mediterranean […] targeting the container yard at the port of Latakia, ”the country’s main commercial port controlled by the government, the Syrian news agency Sana said, citing a military source.
The port of Tartous, the largest in the country, located more than 80 kilometers further south, is operated by a Russian company.
“Violent explosions”
The Sana agency did not report victims, but fires and “significant material damage”, adding that several buildings near the port, including a clinic and shops, had been damaged.
Sana released footage of firefighters trying to control a massive blaze. According to the agency, the targeted containers were filled with “oil and spare parts for cars and other vehicles”.
The governor of Latakia, Ismail Hilal, announced that the firefighters had put out the blaze and that they had started the work of cooling the site, reported Sana.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH), an NGO based in the United Kingdom and which has a vast network of sources in Syria, claims for its part that “weapons and ammunition” were in these containers, adding that it was “not clear” whether they were from Iran, Damascus’ great ally.
The bombardment “led to violent explosions, which were felt in the city of Latakia and its surroundings,” added OSDH.
“We do not believe that situations of this kind contribute to the stability of the Middle East or to the situation in Syria,” said Russia’s deputy representative to the United Nations, Dmitri Polyanski.
“We never hide that we do not approve of such behavior,” he told reporters, adding that Russia, the Syrian regime’s main ally with Iran, “will address the issues bilaterally with Israel” .
On December 7, Israel launched an attack on an Iranian arms shipment in the port of Latakia, claiming no casualties, according to OSDH.
This bombardment had set fire to “a certain number of commercial containers”, had for his part specified Sana, evoking a “response” of the Syrian air defenses.
” No comments “
“We do not comment on foreign media reports,” an IDF spokesperson said on Tuesday when asked about the latest strikes on the port of Latakia.
The Jewish state rarely comments on attacks it is carrying out on its northern neighbor, but has repeatedly stated that it will not allow its enemy, Iran, to expand its influence in Syria.
Iran, considered the main regional ally of the Syrian regime, has provided political, economic and military assistance to Damascus since the start of the conflict in 2011.
Israel has recently stepped up the frequency of its strikes in Syria.
On November 3, airstrikes targeted arms and ammunition depots belonging to Iranian-affiliated fighters on the outskirts of Damascus, according to OSDH.
At the end of October, five fighters affiliated with Iran were killed in an Israeli strike against several positions in the suburbs of the Syrian capital, according to OSDH. The NGO had also reported the death of nine pro-Iranian fighters in an Israeli strike the same month, in the eastern suburbs of Homs, Damascus, confirming the death of a Syrian soldier.
Since the start of the year, Israel has targeted Syria around 30 times, killing 130 people, including five civilians and 125 fighters from the regime or members of forces allied with it, according to OSDH.
The war in Syria has claimed an estimated 500,000 lives, caused massive destruction of infrastructure and displaced millions of people since the conflict began in 2011.