Iran slams Zionist airstrikes in Golan Heights

The Iranian Foreign Ministry on Monday strongly condemned the Israeli helicopter strike near the border town of Quneitra in the occupied Golan Heights in Syria which killed a number of the Lebanese Hezbollah resistance movement fighters.

The ministry in a statement also condoled with families of martyrs and expressed sympathy with those who survived the terrorist act.

‘The terrorist act indicates that the Syria war is a part of confrontation with the Zionist regime and that Hezbollah has stood firmly on the path of Jihad and martyrdom in the face of the occupation and foreign interference in the affairs of other nations,’ the statement added.

According to reports, a military helicopter gunship operated by the Israeli army fired two missiles into Amal Farms in the strategic city of Quneitra, situated some 60 kilometers (37 miles) south of the capital, Damascus, on Sunday. Two remote-controlled reconnaissance drones buzzed overhead as the airborne assault took place.

Following the attack on Sunday, Hezbollah announced that several of its fighters were martyred in the airstrike.

‘A group of Hezbollah combatants were martyred in a Zionist rocket attack in Quneitra, and their names will be revealed later,’ said a message on Hezbollah’s Al-Manar news channel, adding that they were killed during a field reconnaissance mission in the Amal Farms village of Quneitra.

Meanwhile, a Hezbollah official said Jihad Mughniyeh, the son of Hezbollah’s slain top military commander, Imad Mughniyeh, and a field commander were killed in the attack.

A Lebanese security source said the strike destroyed one Hezbollah vehicle entirely and damaged another.

The Tel Aviv regime has carried out several airstrikes in Syria since the start of the nearly four-year-old foreign-backed insurgency there.

Damascus says Tel Aviv and its Western allies are aiding Al-Qaeda-linked militant groups operating inside Syria.

The Syrian army has repeatedly seized huge quantities of Israeli-made weapons and advanced military equipment from the foreign-backed militants inside Syria.

The country has been grappling with a foreign-backed deadly crisis since March 2011. The violence has so far claimed the lives of nearly 200,000 people, according to the UN.