BEIRUT (Dispatches) –
Lebanese political parties have strongly condemned the latest Zionist airstrikes on Syria’s Damascus International Airport and other positions south of the capital, which killed five soldiers and caused material damage, saying such acts of aggression are part of the occupying regime’s efforts to raise the prestige of its armed forces.
The factions said in a joint statement that the aerial assaults were meant to restore the trust of frightened settlers in the “feeble” Israeli army.
“On the one hand, they are under the constant blows of Palestinian resistance fighters, and on the other hand they are fairly fearful of a possible confrontation with the Lebanese Hezbollah movement,” they said.
“These repeated acts of aggression by the occupying Israeli regime will not weaken the Syrian army’s resolve and will not go unpunished. As Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah earlier stated, these dramatic gestures will not faze us a bit. Israel is a bogus regime and its annihilation at the hands of the real owners of Palestinian lands is an inescapable fact,” the statement pointed out.
Syria’s official news agency SANA said Israeli strikes hit the Damascus airport area Friday overnight, and killed five soldiers as a result.
The assaults carried out at approximately 00:45 a.m. local time (2145 GMT Thursday) came “from the northeastern direction of Lake Tiberias, targeting Damascus airport and some points south of Damascus,” it added.
“Our air defenses intercepted hostile missiles in the airspace of Damascus and its countryside, shooting down a number of them,” SANA noted.
“The aggression led to the death of five soldiers and some material damage,” the Syrian news agency quoted an unnamed military source as saying.
Syria has been in the grip of foreign-backed militancy since March 2011. The Syrian government says the Zionist regime and its Western and regional allies aid terrorist groups that continue to wreak havoc in the country.
The occupying regime frequently targets military positions inside Syria, especially those of Hezbollah which has played a key role in helping the Syrian army in its fight against foreign-backed terrorists.
The Zionist regime rarely comments on its cowardly attacks on Syrian territories, which many see as a knee-jerk reaction to the Syrian government’s success in confronting and decimating terrorism.
The regime has been one of the main supporters of terrorist groups that oppose the democratically-elected government of President Bashar al-Assad since the foreign-backed militancy erupted in Syria.