Israeli air strike kills senior Iranian official in Syria

An Israeli air strike outside the Syrian capital Damascus on Monday killed a senior adviser in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, three security sources and Iran’s state media said.

The sources told Reuters that the adviser, known as Sayyed Razi Mousavi, was responsible for coordinating the military alliance between Syria and Iran.

Iran’s state television interrupted its regular news broadcast to announce that Mousavi had been killed, describing him as one of the Guards’ oldest advisers in Syria.

It said he had been “among those accompanying Qassem Soleimani”, the head of the Guards’ elite Quds Force, who was killed in a U.S. drone attack in Iraq in 2020.

Commenting on the incident, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said that Israel would pay for killing Mousavi, who held the rank of brigadier-general in the Guards.

“Undoubtedly, the usurper and savage Zionist regime will pay for this crime,” the Guards said in a statement read on state TV. There was no immediate comment from Israel’s military.

Israel has for years carried out attacks against what it has described as Iran-linked targets in Syria, where Tehran’s influence has grown since it backed President Bashar al-Assad in the war that erupted in Syria in 2011.

Earlier this month, Iran said Israeli strikes had killed two Revolutionary Guards members in Syria who had served as military advisers there.