Israeli strike kills 15 in Damascus

AFP :
An Israeli air strike on Syria’s capital Damascus killed 15 people early Sunday and badly damaged a building in a district home to several state security agencies, a war monitoring group said.
Civilians, including two women, were among those killed in “the deadliest Israeli attack in the Syrian capital” since the start of the civil war, said Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The overnight strike cratered a road and wrecked the adjacent 10-storey building in the city’s Kafr Sousa district, which is home to senior state officials and Syrian intelligence headquarters, said the Britain-based Observatory.
A woman was also killed in the capital’s Mazraa district, possibly hit when Syrian anti-aircraft munitions crashed down from the night sky, said the Observatory.
It was not immediately clear who was the intended target of the strike, which AFP correspondents reported shook the city and left a gaping hole in the street, also blowing out windows of nearby buildings.
Other missiles overnight hit a warehouse used by pro-regime Iranian and Hezbollah fighters near Damascus, said the Observatory, which relies on a wide network of sources inside Syria.
Syria’s defence ministry overnight confirmed the Kafr Sousa attack and gave an initial death toll of five, including one soldier, and 15 wounded civilians, some in critical condition.
Shortly after midnight “the Israeli enemy carried out an aerial aggression from the direction of the occupied Golan Heights targeting several areas in Damascus and its vicinity, including residential neighbourhoods,” it said.
Syrian defence forces had “shot down several missiles”, the ministry added in its statement.
Historic buildings near the medieval Damascus citadel were also “severely damaged,” said the head of the Syrian antiquities department, Nazir Awad, who blamed “an Israeli missile.”
An Israeli army spokesperson on Sunday said “Israel does not comment on reports in foreign media.”