Strike in Syria kills dozens of soldiers, Hezbollah members
Netanyahu says Israel preparing for Rafah attack
A strike inside syria early Friday killed dozens of syrian soldiers and some members of the Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah, a Hezbollah spokesperson told The Washington post. The syrian state news agency blamed Israel for the attack.
The Hezbollah spokesperson and syria’s state news agency blamed the attack on Israel. Hezbollah later announced the deaths of three members, and the spokesman said they were killed in Aleppo in the north. The spokesperson for Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed militant group and political party, spoke on the condition of anonymity according to the organization’s rules and was not immediately able to provide more detail.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the families of soldiers held captive in the Gaza strip that continued military pressure was the only way to secure the hostages’ release, reiterating Israel’s intention to launch an offensive in the crowded southern Gaza city of Rafah.
“Only continuation of the forceful military pressure that we have applied, and will yet apply, will return our hostages, will return everyone,” Netanyahu told the relatives of the Israeli soldiers who have been held captive in Gaza since the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas.
“We are holding the northern Gaza strip and Khan Younis,” he added, according to a translation from an official readout from the meeting. “We have bisected the strip and we are preparing to enter Rafah.”
earlier in the day, syria’s state news agency SANA reported that an unspecified number of “civilians and soldiers” were killed and wounded in earlymorning attacks in the northern Aleppo province. The Israel Defense Forces declined to comment.
Reuters, citing security sources, reported that 38 people, including five members of Hezbollah, were killed, which would make it one of the deadliest reported attacks so far in an intensified Israeli push against Iran’s allies in syria.
Israel rarely offers details on specific operations in syria, but it has confirmed striking Iranian positions in the past, as well as syrian chemical weapons facilities. since Israel’s war in Gaza began, syria and Israel have exchanged shelling. In January, Iran accused Israel of carrying out a deadly strike on the syrian capital, Damascus, which it said killed five Iranian military advisers and “a number of syrian forces.”
The Biden administration, UN agencies, and humanitarian groups have repeatedly expressed objection to a potential Israeli military offensive in Rafah, home to some 1.4 million displaced palestinians, but Netanyahu has remained defiant in the face of mounting international pressure to abandon those plans. Israel says Rafah holds a network of Hamas tunnels that the Israel Defense Forces suspects hold not only thousands of fighters, but also its “most wanted” commanders — alongside more than 100 Israeli hostages.
In other developments, the palestinian Authority’s recently appointed prime minister, mohammad mustafa, on Thursday announced the names of 22 ministers who would join him as members of a new cabinet. The Biden administration has expressed hope that a rehabilitated palestinian Authority, which runs parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank, could become the postwar government for Gaza.
Israeli forces are carrying out operations around al-Amal Hospital in southern Gaza, the Israeli military said. And their raid on al-shifa Hospital in the north continues, spokesman Daniel Hagari said Thursday. He added that the Israel Defense Forces had identified 513 people at alshifa Hospital it suspected of being “terrorists from Hamas and Islamic Jihad.”
An Israeli strike also killed 10 palestinian police officers and injured several civilians in an attack on shejaiya sports club east of Gaza City on Friday, a Gaza Civil Defense official said Friday.
Gaza’s armed police have become a target of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. some officers have ditched their uniforms to avoid being targeted, and the police role in protecting aid convoys has dwindled — a major obstacle to aid distribution inside the enclave, according to the United Nations and other aid groups.