Airstrikes in central Syria overnight Thursday that Syrian reports attributed to Israel killed four members of one family, including both parents and two children, a Syrian military official reported Friday morning.
The same official reported that four other people, including two more children, had been wounded in the strike. Three homes north of the city Hama were reportedly destroyed.
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Overnight Thursday, Syrian media outlets reported that Israeli warplanes had struck several military targets in the central province of Hama.
State-news agency SANA quoted an unnamed military official as saying the attack took place shortly before dawn when Israeli jets flew over neighboring Lebanon.
It added that Syrian air defense units shot down most of the missiles.
Israel has launched hundreds of strikes against Iran-linked military targets in Syria over the years but rarely acknowledges or discusses such operations.
This was the first strike attributed to Israel in Syria since US President Joe Biden took office on Wednesday.
One Syrian journalist affiliated with the Bashar Assad regime reported that several civilians in the city of Hama were wounded in the airstrike.
The opposition-affiliated Step News Agency also reported casualties in the attack on installations belonging to the Syrian regime and Iranian militia in the Hama region.
Tension has been high in the Middle East over the past weeks as many had feared retaliation for the US killing of Iran's Quds Force commander Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani last year in Baghdad.
On Jan. 13, Israeli warplanes carried out intense airstrikes in eastern Syria apparently targeting positions and arms depots of Iran-backed forces. At least 57 fighters were killed and dozens were wounded, according to a Syrian opposition war monitoring group.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor that tracks Syria's war, said it recorded 39 Israeli strikes inside Syria in 2020 that hit 135 targets, including military posts, warehouses or vehicles.
Israel views Iranian entrenchment on its northern frontier as a red line, and it has repeatedly struck Iran-linked facilities and weapons convoys destined for Hezbollah in Lebanon.
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