At least
42 Syrian soldiers
and fighters from the Lebanese Hezbollah movement were killed in
an Israeli attack
early Friday in the Aleppo region in the north of the country, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH) said.
The organization, based in the United Kingdom and with a wide network of sources in Syria, said that the attack targeted
"missile depots of Hezbollah", an ally of the Syrian regime,
the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas and Iran, Israel's regional arch-enemy. .
It is the deadliest death toll among the ranks of the Syrian army due to an Israeli attack
since
the war in the Gaza Strip between the Jewish State and Hamas began in October, according to this organization.
Since this conflict began, Hezbollah, in solidarity with Palestinian Hamas, has attacked targets in northern Israel from southern Lebanon almost daily.
An Israeli plane bombs Syria. Photo: Reuters/file
Israel has responded to these Hezbollah attacks,
hitting targets in Lebanese territory
increasingly deeper, the latest more than 100 km from the border.
In parallel, the Israeli army
has intensified its attacks on pro-Iranian elements in Syria since October,
a country in which it has attacked numerous targets since the civil war began there in 2011.
In the middle of this month, the Israeli army announced that it had attacked "around 4,500 Hezbollah targets" in Lebanon and Syria since the outbreak of the war with Hamas in Gaza.
Palestinians search for survivors after a bombing in Gaza. Photo: EFE
The OSDH reported that 36 Syrian soldiers and six Hezbollah fighters were killed, in addition to dozens of wounded, in that attack, which occurred in an area near the Aleppo airport.
Previously, the OSDH had reported a death toll of 36, referring only to casualties in the Syrian army.
A Syrian military source, cited by the official Sana press agency, reported
"several deaths and injuries among civilians and soldiers" due to an Israeli attack
on army positions around Aleppo.
"The Israeli enemy launched an airstrike against different positions in Athriya, southeast of Aleppo," this source said.
Early this Friday there were also
actions directed against factories
that depend on the Syrian Ministry of Defense in Safira, near Aleppo, but which are now under the control of pro-Iranian groups, according to the OSDH.
The Israeli army "does not comment"
Contacted by AFP from Jerusalem, the Israeli army said, as it usually does in these cases, that it
does not comment on press reports from foreign media.
Hezbollah has elements in Syria who have supported President Bashar al Assad in that country's civil war and have continued to operate to protect its supply lines with Iran.
Tehran claims its presence in Syria
is limited to military advisers.
On Thursday,
an attack hit a residential property on the outskirts of Damascus
, causing at least two deaths, the Sana press agency had reported, which blamed the action on Israel.
On March 19, there were already Israeli bombings against Hezbollah weapons depots around the Syrian capital.
With information from the Associated Press