An Israeli raid struck early Monday, August 28 in the morning, the international airport of Aleppo (North), the second city of Syria, for the fourth time since the beginning of the year. According to official Syrian media, the raid caused “property damage on the tarmac which put the airport out of service”. “Around 4:30 a.m., the Israeli enemy carried out an aerial assault from the Mediterranean, west of Latakia, against Aleppo International Airport”said the official SANA news agency, citing a military source.
An official of the Syrian Ministry of Transport, Sleiman Khalil, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that “the airport’s only operational tarmac had been damaged”. “Technical teams will start repairs today so that the airport can become operational again as soon as possible”, he added. Flights were diverted to airports in Damascus, the capital, and Latakia (west), he said.
Since the beginning of the war in Syria, Israel has carried out hundreds of airstrikes on Syrian territory, mainly targeting the forces supported by Iran and the Lebanese Hezbollah, allies of Damascus and sworn enemies of Israel, as well as the Syrian army. Israel, a neighboring country of Syria, rarely comments on the strikes but says it wants to prevent Iran from establishing itself on its doorstep. Asked by AFP, an Israeli military spokesman declined to comment on Monday: “We do not comment on foreign media reports. »
Weapons depots targeted at Nayrab military airfield
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH), Monday’s strikes targeted, in addition to Aleppo airport, “arms depots” at the nearby Nayrab military airfield. The Aleppo region and the airport have been repeatedly targeted by Israeli raids since the beginning of the year. In early May, four Syrian soldiers and three foreign fighters from pro-Iranian groups were killed in strikes, which targeted Aleppo airport and again an arms depot at Nayrab airfield, according to the OSDH .
In March, Israeli strikes twice put Aleppo airport out of service. On March 7, three people were killed there. Two weeks later, strikes targeted the airport and arms depots of pro-Iranian groups in its surroundings, killing four people according to the OSDH, an organization based in the United Kingdom and which has a vast network of sources in Syria.
Iran-backed militias have a strong presence in the Aleppo region and provided essential ground support to the Syrian army during the recapture of rebel-held areas of the city in 2016. The war in Syria, which began in 2011 by the repression of pro-democracy demonstrations, caused more than half a million deaths and displaced several million people.