Israel has intensified its strikes in recent weeks on Syrian territory in an explosive regional context, its army confronting Palestinian Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Two leaders of Islamic Jihad were killed in an Israeli strike on Thursday in Syria, the armed Palestinian group which participated in the attack of October 7, 2023, said on November 16.
In a statement, Islamic Jihad said that Abdel Aziz Al Minaoui, “a leading leader” born in 1945, and Rasmi Youssouf Abou Issa, “responsible for relations (with Arab countries)” born in 1972, had been killed “with a group of movement executives” in an Israeli strike Thursday against “offices and residential apartments”. Their bodies were removed from the rubble on Saturday, added the group, which expressed its “determination to continue the resistance”.
23 dead in Israeli raids
A little earlier, a source within Islamic Jihad announced to AFP the death of the two leaders, specifying that they had died in an Israeli strike in the locality of Quudsaya, in the suburbs of Damascus, against a building sheltering one of the group's offices in Syria. The Israeli army refused to comment on this information. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH) announced Friday that 23 people, including Palestinian and pro-Iranian fighters, had been killed the day before in Israeli raids in Syria.
The OSDH reported 13 dead in a strike against buildings in a residential complex reserved for the military in Damascus and ten others, presented as members of Islamic Jihad, in another strike in Qudsaya. An Israeli army spokesperson confirmed on Thursday strikes carried out in Syria against “Islamic Jihad military bases”an armed group active in Gaza. A new Israeli strike targeted the upscale neighborhood of Mazzé on Friday, according to the official Syrian news agency Sana.
Israel has intensified its strikes in recent weeks on Syrian territory in an explosive regional context, its army confronting Palestinian Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Islamic Jihad is still holding hostages people kidnapped during the October 7, 2023 attack in southern Israel. This week the group published two video clips of Sacha Trupanov, a 29-year-old Russian-Israeli hostage.
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