Eleven dead reported in Syria: drones attack Iranian weapons convoy

A truck convoy carrying weapons from Iran is fired upon in eastern Syria.

Eleven dead reported in Syria: drones attack Iranian weapons convoy

A truck convoy carrying weapons from Iran is fired upon in eastern Syria. According to Syrian activists, a commander of pro-Iranian militias was among the eleven dead. Israel has previously acknowledged similar attacks and classified the supplies as a threat.

According to activists, a total of eleven people were killed in a series of drone attacks in eastern Syria on truck convoys suspected to be loaded with Iranian weapons and pro-Iranian militias. Drivers, their escorts and a pro-Iranian commander were killed in the attacks on Sunday evening and Monday in the Abu Kamal region of Deir Essor province on the border with Iraq, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported.

It was unclear who carried out the attack. "The trucks were loaded with Iranian weapons and they were destroyed," said the head of the observatory, Rami Abdel Rahman. The dead were therefore not Syrians. According to the Observatory, the first convoy attacked consisted of six refrigerated trucks and had traveled to Syria via Iraq. Initially, seven people were killed in attacks on these trucks, then three more on Monday morning when the site was to be inspected by a pro-Iranian commander. According to the activists, the three dead were the commander and his two bodyguards. A third drone attack on Monday afternoon was aimed at "a tanker truck loaded with weapons and ammunition for pro-Iranian militias," according to the observatory. One person was killed when the truck exploded.

In addition to the convoy, "the headquarters of pro-Iranian militias" were also attacked on Sunday, said the activist and operator of the local news site "Deir Ezzor 24", Omar Abu Leila. A Syrian official told AFP the convoy attacked on Sunday consisted of 25 trucks and had been attacked three times in 24 hours. He had an "entry permit to Syria" and was not transporting weapons, but aid supplies from Iran.

Tehran is providing military assistance to its ally Damascus in the Syrian civil war. According to the Observatory, at least two similar convoys entered Syria from Iraq last week and unloaded their cargo at pro-Iranian groups in the eastern city of Al-Majadeen. Pro-Iranian militias, including the Lebanese Hezbollah, have a strong presence on the Iraqi-Syrian border.

Similar attacks have repeatedly taken place in the region in recent months. In December, Israeli Chief of Staff Aviv Kochavi said that the month before, Israel had orchestrated an attack on a weapons convoy and fuel tankers belonging to pro-Iranian militias in the region. Kochavi recently denounced "the armies that Iran is trying to build across the Middle East" as a threat to Israel.

Israel rarely says anything specific about its airstrikes in Syria, but has repeatedly insisted that it would not allow Iran to extend its influence to Israel's borders. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights obtains its information from a network of different sources in Syria. The information provided by the organization can often hardly be verified by an independent party.