Five dead as Israeli missile strikes residential area in Damascus

An Israeli rocket strike early on Sunday hit a building in the central Damascus neighbourhood of Kafr Sousa, near a heavily guarded security complex close to Iranian installations, killing five people, witnesses and officials said.

The strike, a rare one aimed at a residential area in the heart of the city, damaged several buildings in the densely populated district close to Omayyad square. 

An Israeli military spokesperson declined to comment. Citing a Syrian military source, state media said Israel had carried out air strikes targeting several areas in the capital shortly after midnight, causing five deaths and 15 injuries among civilians. “It caused damage to several civilian homes and material damage to a number of neighbourhoods in Damascus and its vicinity,” the Syrian army said.

Syrian military sources said stray anti-aircraft rockets fired from the strategic Mount Qasioun to counter the Israeli attack hit several other locations, including the vicinity of the capital’s historic citadel.  

It was not immediately clear whether the strike that hit the basement of the building was aimed at a specific individual. 

Two western intelligence sources said the target was a logistics centre in the building run by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).