Three pro-Iran fighters killed in Israeli strikes near Damascus — monitor

BEIRUT — Israeli air strikes killed three pro-Iran fighters on Wednesday as they hit sites belonging to the powerful Lebanese Hizbollah group near the Syrian capital Damascus, a war monitor said.

Israel has struck Syria several times in the past month as regional tensions simmer over the Hamas-Israel war in the Gaza Strip.

"Three non-Syrian pro-Iran fighters were killed in Israeli strikes on farms and other sites belonging to Hizbollah near Akraba and Sayyida Zeinab," said Rami Abdel Rahman, who heads the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor.

Akraba houses a military airport, the monitor said, more than 10 kilometres from Damascus International Airport.

Israel also struck Syrian air defence sites in the country's southern Sweida province, said the monitor with a network of sources inside Syria.

Syrian state media said Israeli air strikes had hit military sites in southern Syria, causing material damage.

"At approximately 22:50 pm today, the Israeli enemy carried out an air attack from the direction of Baalbek in Lebanon, targeting some military points in the southern region, causing some material losses," official news agency SANA said, quoting a military source.

Last month, Israeli strikes had put Syria’s two main airports in Damascus and Aleppo out of service several times in two weeks.

During more than a decade of civil war in Syria, Israel has launched hundreds of air strikes on its northern neighbour, primarily targeting Hizbollah fighters and other Iran-backed forces as well as Syrian army positions.

Israel rarely comments on individual strikes on Syria, but it has repeatedly said it won’t allow arch-foe Iran, which backs President Bashar Assad’s government, to expand its presence there.