Iranian forces in Syria have launched a rocket attack on Israeli army bases in the Golan Heights, Israel says, prompting one of the heaviest Israeli barrages against Syria since the conflict there began in 2011.
The attack on the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, just past midnight on Thursday, marked the first time Iranian forces have hit Israel from Syria.
The Iranians have deployed in Syria along with Iran-backed Shi’ite militias and Russian troops to support President Bashar al-Assad in the country’s civil war.
Dozens of Israeli missiles hit a radar station, Syrian air defence positions and an ammunition dump, Syrian state media said.
“I hope we finished this chapter and everyone got the message,” Israeli Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman said on Thursday morning.
Israel said 20 Iranian Grad and Fajr rockets were shot down by its Iron Dome air defence system or fell short of the Golan targets. The Quds Force, an external arm of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, carried out the launch, Israel said.
Read the report by Stephen Farrell and Angus McDowall (Reuters) in the Herald Sun.