A string of suicide attacks in Syria by the Islamic State group has killed at least 54 people, mostly pro-regime fighters, in one of the deadliest operations in months, a war monitor said yesterday.
“Three bombers with explosive belts targeted Sweida city alone, while the other blasts hit villages to the north and east,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Rami Abdel Rahman, the head of the Britain-based observatory, said the group then followed up with further attacks, seizing three of the seven villages it had targeted.
He said 32 pro-government fighters and 22 civilians had been killed, and more than 30 people wounded in the attack on populated areas close to Sweida.
The official Syrian Arab News Agency confirmed the attack had killed and wounded people in the provincial capital.
State television also reported casualties in villages to the north and east, adding that the army was “targeting positions of the Daesh [Islamic State] terrorist group” in Sweida Province’s eastern countryside.
Abdel Rahman said unidentified warplanes were also targeting Islamic State group fighters in the area.
Despite pro-government forces ousting the group from urban centers in eastern Syria last year, surprise raids in recent months have killed dozens of regime and allied fighters.
The regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has in recent weeks ousted rebels from a majority of the nation’s south, part of which borders the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
The regime controls almost all of Sweida Province, but the Islamic State group retains a presence in desert areas of its north and east.
It is now closing in on a patch of territory in nearby Daraa Province held by the Jaish Khaled bin al-Walid group, which has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group.
The group has been the target of an intense campaign of bombing by Russian and Syrian jets.
A Syrian military source on Tuesday accused Israel of firing at one of its warplanes as it carried out operations against militants in southern Syria.
Israel’s army earlier said it had shot down a Syrian fighter jet that had infiltrated Israeli airspace, risking another escalation in the sensitive border zone.
The observatory later said air operations had dramatically decreased following the incident.
The Damascus regime has long accused Israel of backing the Islamic State group and other opposition factions.
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