On 12 January Israeli aircraft carried out multiple missile strikes on the suburbs of the Syrian capital Damascus. The attack was repelled by the Syrian Air Defence and most of the missiles were shot down, while a warehouse near Damascus International Airport was damaged by the strikes.
READ MORE: WATCH Syrian Army Repel Israeli Attack on Damascus
“The Israel Defense Forces has attacked hundreds of Iranian and Hezbollah targets. Just in the past 36 hours, the air force attacked Iranian depots full of Iranian weapons in the Damascus International Airport,” Netanyahu said, speaking at the weekly cabinet meeting in his Jerusalem office, as cited by The Times of Israel.
He also added that "the accumulation of recent attacks proves that we are determined more than ever to take action against Iran in Syria, and we will strike harder in Syria if needed.".
The Syrian Foreign Ministry said it had sent letters to the United Nations following an Israeli aerial attack near Damascus. Syria's Foreign Ministry has demanded that the United Nations take immediate measures to prevent new Israeli attacks.
It is not the first time Israeli authorities have said that Tel Aviv is conducting operations against Iranian targets in Syria, while ignoring Tehran's statement that its forces maintain an exclusively advisory role in Syria, denying any plans to establish a permanent military presence in the country.
Earlier in December, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to continue Israeli operations in Syria to counter Iran's military presence in the country, following Washington's decision to withdraw from the Arab Republic.
