MITHILA RAHMAN TUSI
Iran's Islamic Progressive Guardian Corps (IRGC) says four of its "military guides" were killed in an Israeli airstrike on a private structure in the Syrian capital, Damascus.
Syrian state media SANA said Saturday's attack occurred in the Mazzeh area. He said "Israeli hostility" designated the structure.
A highly informed source told Al Jazeera that the target was an IRGC intelligence unit, adding that a senior IRGC intelligence official in Syria and his collaborators were in the structure.
In a brief explanation, the IRGC said an airstrike by Israeli aircraft killed "several Syrian powers and four military guides." He later distinguished murdered people such as Hojjatollah Omidvar, Ali Aghazadeh, Hossein Mohammadi and Saied Karimi, without sharing their positions.
Iranian state television called it an attack by "psychological militants" by Israel, which currently appears unable to comment.
The attack, believed to have been carried out with at least four rockets, completely destroyed a four-story building, Iranian state media reported. About one individual was taken to an emergency clinic.
Saturday's attack comes amid rising tension in the region and Israeli hostility in Gaza that has killed nearly 25,000 people.
Israel has recently carried out numerous strikes against hotspots connected to Iran within government-controlled areas of war-torn Syria.
"Syria is not only a milestone of the epic confrontation between provincial and world powers, but it is also a terrain for scientific battles," said Al Jazeera's Resul Serdar, from Tehran.
"For Iran, Lebanon and especially Hezbollah, Syria is a vital component in the so-called 'Opposition Center', which is why their entire presence in Syria is kept secret," he added. Last month, an Israeli airstrike in a Damascus suburb killed Iranian General Sayyed Razi Mousavi, a long-term consultant to the IRGC in Syria.
Israel rarely acknowledges its activities in Syria but has said it targets bases of groups associated with Iran, such as Lebanon's Hezbollah, which has sent large numbers of fighters to support Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's powers.
Recently, an attack allegedly carried out by Israel killed senior Hamas official Saleh al-Arouri in Lebanon's capital, Beirut.
Over the course of recent weeks, rockets have been fired from Syria into northern Israel and the Israeli-involved Golan Heights, increasing tensions along the Lebanese-Israeli border and attacks on ships in the Red Ocean by Yemen's pro-Iran Houthi rebels. Iran attacked Erbil, the capital of the semi-independent district of Iraqi Kurdistan, on Monday with long-range rockets in what it said was an assault on an Israeli government operational base camp, a claim denied by Iraqi and Iraqi Kurdish authorities. At least four people died in the assault.
News-AL Jazeera
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