Syrian airstrike kills Iranian adviser, WHO team member

A series of airstrikes in eastern Syria on Tuesday killed more than a dozen people, including an Iranian military adviser and a member of a team working for the World Health Organization, officials and reports said.

It was unclear who was behind the airstrikes in Deir ez-Zor province in eastern Syria, which borders Iraq.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based opposition war monitoring group, said the attack killed 15 people, including an Iranian adviser to Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guards, two of his bodyguards, and nine Iraqis from Iran-backed groups warrior. Two Syrians worked with the Iranians. It added that a Syrian engineer was also killed.

Iran’s state news agency confirmed that a member of the Revolutionary Guards was killed in Syria.

Syria’s pro-government media Dama Post stated that the targets of the attack were Deir ez-Zor, the capital of Deir ez-Zor province, as well as the towns of Mayadin and Boukamal. It is said that 20 people were among the dead, including women and children.

The World Health Organization said one of its team members, engineer Emad Shehab, was killed in an attack on its building. Shihab, 42, is said to have been serving as the World Health Organization’s water, sanitation and hygiene coordinator in the province since 2022.

No one claimed responsibility for the strike. Israel has frequently launched attacks on Iran-linked targets in Syria but rarely acknowledged them.

In neighboring Lebanon, the state-run National News Agency reported an Israeli airstrike on the village of Ziboud in the northeastern Hermel region. The report said the attack took place in a mountainous area, but did not disclose details or whether it caused casualties.

Avichay Adraee, the Arabic-language spokesman for the Israeli army, posted on X that the Israeli air force attacked military facilities used by Hezbollah’s air force in Ziboud. He said the attack hit several buildings and an airport.

Adre said the attack was in retaliation for Hezbollah firing rockets at the Mount Melon air traffic control base in northern Israel.

Earlier on Tuesday, Hezbollah said its militants fired missiles at its Mount Melon base in retaliation for an airstrike in eastern Lebanon on Sunday that killed a Syrian citizen. Later in the day, Hezbollah said it fired more than 50 rockets at a command center in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights in retaliation for the attack on Ziboud.