The hulks of half-submerged Syrian missile ships smouldered in Latakia harbour on Tuesday, hours after Israel hammered its neighbour with strikes from the ocean and air.
The Israeli strikes got here a day after Syrian president Bashar al-Assad was ousted from energy and have been amongst greater than 300 raids throughout Syria in current days, in keeping with the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The Observatory reported that in a single day Monday, “Israeli warplanes” had broken about 10 navy ships and hit further navy targets, together with “the Barzeh scientific analysis centre” and military warehouses in and round Latakia’s port.
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz stated the navy struck Latakia with missile ships.
Western nations, together with america, struck the Latakia analysis facility in 2018, saying it was associated to Syria’s “chemical weapons infrastructure”.
On Tuesday morning, an AFP journalist on the scene described the three blocks of buildings that made up the centre as destroyed, with tons of of paperwork scattered round, fires nonetheless burning on the facility and the robust scent of explosives lingering within the air.
On the port, a plume of darkish gray smoke rose above a minimum of three Soviet-era warships outfitted with machine weapons and missile launchers that had been a part of the Syrian navy.
A port employee described listening to “unusual and strange sounds” by means of the night time, and stated he later came upon in regards to the strikes from his colleagues and social media networks.
“We requested round about what was occurring, nobody knew. There was no electrical energy, however we came upon by means of Fb that these have been Israeli air strikes focusing on the port,” Samir Alloush stated.
One other employee, Ahmed Khabbazi, additionally stated he “heard the sounds of the air strikes”.
“This morning, we went down and noticed that the Israeli military had struck the previous regime’s navy boats,” he stated.
– Netanyahu warns new rulers –
The area of Latakia is the heartland of Assad’s minority Alawite neighborhood, however after the insurgent takeover, folks toppled a statue of the deposed president’s father.
Visiting certainly one of Israel’s key naval bases in Haifa on Tuesday, Katz confirmed the navy had hit a number of Syrian naval vessels in in a single day “in depth operational actions”.
He stated the operation had been carried by the Israeli navy utilizing “missile ships.”
“The navy operated final night time to destroy the Syrian fleet with nice success,” Katz stated in a press release.
He stated the navy “has been working in Syria in current days to strike and destroy strategic capabilities that threaten the State of Israel.”
“I warn right here the leaders of the rebels in Syria: anybody who follows Assad’s path will find yourself like Assad — we won’t permit an excessive Islamic terrorist entity to behave towards Israel past its border, placing its residents in danger.”
Katz stated that along with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he had instructed the navy to “set up a sterile defence zone freed from weapons and terrorist threats in southern Syria, with no everlasting Israeli presence.”
In a while Tuesday, Netanyahu warned the brand new rulers in Syria towards following within the footsteps of the earlier regime and permitting Iran to “re-establish” itself within the nation.
“If this regime permits Iran to re-establish itself in Syria, or permits the switch of Iranian weapons or another weapons to Hezbollah, or if it assaults us — we’ll reply forcefully, and we’ll actual a heavy worth”, Netanyahu stated in a video assertion.
“What occurred to the earlier regime will occur to this one.”
