22 killed, including 9 Iranians, in IDF attack on Syrian base – report

Nine Iranian forces were killed during an air attack reportedly carried out by Israel on a Syrian military base near Aleppo. 

By: World Israel News Staff

Syrian rebel forces claimed that 22 people, including nine Iranians, were killed in an overnight strike in northern Syria that has been blamed on Israel, the Qatar-based al-Jazeera network reported Monday.

The figure, which could not be confirmed, was much higher than an earlier report of nine deaths provided by a Syrian watchdog group.

Iranian troops were reportedly deployed at a military base in Syria near Aleppo that was reportedly attacked by IDF air forces.

Six Syrian soldiers were killed in the attack along with at least three more whose citizenship was undetermined, according to Rami Abdul Rahman, who runs the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

“On the evening of Sunday the 15th of July, explosions rocked the area of Nayrab Military Airbase, which is controlled by the [Assad] regime forces and gunmen loyal to them in the outskirts of Aleppo city,” the Observatory said in a statement.

“It turned out that they were caused by rocket targeting believed to be Israeli, which targeted positions of the regime forces and gunmen loyal to them in Nayrab Military Airbase and its vicinity.”

The IDF has reportedly hit Syrian positions near Damascus and in the central provinces of Homs and Hama in the past. However, it rarely attacks as far north as Aleppo.

The raid came hours before a major summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump, where Syria and Iran are expected to be on the agenda.