Screen image of reported Israeli airstrike in Syria yesterday. Photo: Screenshot.

JNS.org – The Syrian government is accusing Israel of a “flagrant attack” in which the Jewish state allegedly bombed military targets in Damascus in airstrikes on Sunday.

Reports indicate that the two targeted sites were weapons warehouses, one near the city’s international airport and another close to the Lebanese border. It is not yet confirmed whether the weapons were intended to be used by the Lebanon-based terror group Hezbollah, which supports Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. But Israel has carried out such strikes in the past, intended to destroy shipments of Iranian missiles bound for Hezbollah.

The Israeli government has neither confirmed nor denied the airstrikes. But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday in his weekly cabinet meeting that “we are following the Middle East and what is happening very closely, with wide open eyes and ears… We will continue to keep our fingers on the pulse.”

Israeli Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz told Army Radio on Monday that Israel has “a very potent defense policy that is oriented toward safeguarding the country and wherever possible preventing the upgrading of weaponry that gives terrorist organizations game-changers or unusually sophisticated means of attack.”

During a joint news conference in Tehran, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif denounced the airstrikes. Moallem said the strikes “lifted the morale of terrorists,” and Zarif said Syria must urgently “dry up the sources of terrorism.” The missiles destroyed in the strikes were reportedly made by Russia, which spurred the Russian government to send a letter to the United Nations protesting Israel’s “aggressive action.”