Israel attacks Iranian consulate building in Damascus, Syria

DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — A israeli airstrike destroyed the section consular of the Iranian embassy in Damascuskilling a top Iranian military advisor and several more people who were inside, Syrian state media reported on Monday.

The attack on the Iranian consulate building could mark an escalation in the Israeli military’s ongoing attacks on Iranian military officials and allies in Syria, which have intensified since the start of its war with Hamas in Gaza on October 7.

Israel, which rarely acknowledges such attacks, said it had no comment on the Syrian media reports.

Iran’s Arabic-language state television Al-Alam and pan-Arab television station Al-Mayadeen, which has reporters in Syria, reported that the attack claimed the life of Iranian military adviser Gen. Ali Reza Zahdi —who previously led Iran’s elite Quds Force in Lebanon and Syria until 2016.

Rescue crews work on a building destroyed by an Israeli bombardment in Damascus, Syria, Monday, April 1, 2024 Credit: AP Photo/Omar Sanadiki

The Iranian ambassador Hossein Akbari condemned Israel’s attack and reported that at least seven people were killed, but that rescuers were still searching for other bodies in the rubble. He added that two police officers guarding the building were injured.

Akbari vowed revenge for the attack “with the same magnitude and harshness.”

Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad, told the media after meeting with Akbari that “several” people died, without offering details. In a phone call with his Iranian counterpart Hossein AmirabdollahianMekdad condemned the attack.

Iranian state television reported that the Iranian ambassador’s residence was inside the consular building, located next to the embassy.

Citing an unnamed military source, the state news agency SANA reported that the building in the heavily guarded neighborhood of Mazzeh collapsed. In recent years, Israel has carried out hundreds of attacks against targets inside government-controlled parts of Syria.

These airstrikes have intensified in recent months in the context of Israel’s war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip and ongoing clashes between the Israeli army and Hezbollah on the Lebanese-Israeli border.

Although it rarely acknowledges its actions in Syria, Israel has said it targets bases of Iran-allied militant groups, such as Hezbollah of Lebanonwhich has sent thousands of fighters to support the Syrian president’s forces Bashar Assad.

An Israeli bombing in a Damascus neighborhood in December killed Seyed Razi Mousavi, a former adviser to the Iranian paramilitary Revolutionary Guard in Syria. A similar attack on a building in Damascus in January killed at least five Iranian advisers.

Last week, airstrikes on Syria’s strategic eastern province of Deir el-Zour, near the Iraqi border, killed an Iranian adviser.

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