Syria condemned Israeli airstrike near Damascus
The strike adds to tension after an earlier attack on Abu al-Duhur airbase drew a rare US rebuke and a dispute over Turkey’s role in Syria.
Sunday, 23 August 2026 09:43
Syria condemned an Israeli strike on Beit Jinn, southwest of Damascus, saying it violated its sovereignty and international law, BBC News reported.
Syrian officials said the attack hit a civilian vehicle and left several people injured. Israel’s military said in a post on X that it had targeted a “terrorist” in the “final stages” of preparing attacks that posed an immediate threat to soldiers.
The strike was the second known Israeli attack on Syria in the past week. It came days after reports that Israel had struck the Abu al-Duhur military airbase, 70km from the Turkish border, which Syria said threatened to escalate regional tensions.
Washington called the earlier strike an “unnecessary escalation that does not advance regional stability”. US ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack said in an interview on Friday that the strike could be “the Israelis baiting the Turks” to draw Turkey into a conflict before upcoming Israeli elections.
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz called Barrack’s account “full of inaccuracies” and said Israeli forces acted “in light of clear intelligence information about Turkey's intentions”. The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said: “Israel and Syria agreed to a status quo in security matters, which Syria was on the verge of breaching by permitting Turkish troops to deploy at an airbase near Aleppo.”
Turkey did not confirm whether any troops moved to Abu al-Duhur and rejected Israel’s suggestion that it posed a threat. The airbase has been out of service as a dedicated military airfield since 2013 and was seized by rebel forces in December 2024, after which Syria began rebuilding military facilities damaged in the offensive that overthrew Bashar al-Assad.
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