UPDATE – Israel claims airstrike on Islamic Jihad building in Syrian capital

UPDATES WITH DETAILS

By Ahmed Asmar and Rania Abu Shamala

ANKARA (AA) – Israel claimed on Thursday that its warplanes struck a building of the Palestinian group Islamic Jihad in the Syrian capital Damascus.

A military statement said the strike was based on intelligence, calling the targeted building a “command center” for the group.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said Tel Aviv “will not allow Syria to become a threat against Israel.”

An Islamic Jihad spokesman, for his part, denied the Israeli allegations, saying the hit site was “an empty building, not a command center.”

Syria’s state news agency SANA confirmed the Israeli attack on a building in the Mashroua Dummar area on the outskirts of Damascus.

According to the broadcaster, three people, including an elderly woman, were injured in the Israeli strike, which caused substantial damage to a residential building and partially damaged two adjacent buildings.

After the fall of the Bashar al-Assad regime, Israel expanded its occupation of the Syrian Golan Heights by seizing the demilitarized buffer zone, a move that violated the 1974 disengagement agreement with Syria.

Israel also launched hundreds of airstrikes that targeted military sites and assets across Syria, including fighter jets, missile systems and air defense installations, according to reports.

Assad, Syria’s leader for nearly 25 years, fled to Russia after anti-regime groups took control of Damascus on Dec. 8, ending the Baath Party’s regime, which had been in power since 1963.

Ahmed al-Sharaa, who led anti-regime forces to oust Assad, was declared president for a transitional period in late January.