Sixty-eight pro-Iran militants were killed in Israeli air strikes on the Syrian city of Palmyra, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said on Thursday.
Those killed in Wednesday’s strikes included 42 fighters from pro-Iran Syrian groups, 26 foreign fighters, most of them from the Iraqi Al-Nujaba movement, and four from Lebanon’s Hezbollah armed group, the monitor said.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said “Israeli strikes targeted two positions of pro-Iran groups in the Homs region,” including “a Hezbollah site in the Qusair area” near the border where “six Iran-backed fighters were killed.”
It did not specify their nationalities.
The Observatory, which is based in the UK and whose sources of funding are unclear, has been accused of exaggerating the effectiveness of Israeli strikes in the past.
A Hezbollah source told AFP that at least one fighter from the group was killed in Israeli strikes in the Qusayr area.
Israel rarely comments on individual strikes in Syria but has repeatedly said it will not allow Iran to expand its presence there.
On Saturday, the Observatory said an Israeli drone strike near the Lebanese border targeted a vehicle carrying “a Hezbollah commander and his companion,” without reporting casualties.
Hezbollah did not announce any deaths among its ranks on Saturday.
