Three killed in Israeli strikes in Syria's Homs, Hama

Israeli warplanes targeted sites in Homs and Hama provinces in central Syria on Friday evening, according to Syrian pro-regime media, with three reported killed.

A war monitor affiliated with the Syrian opposition who gave his name as "Abu Amin" said that Israeli aircraft targeted sites in the Hama countryside, including a scientific research centre, weapons depots at a command site belonging to the 47th Brigade, and a veterinary college.

An air defence battalion was also targeted in Homs province near the border with Lebanon.

Abu Amin reported that depots in the area where the research centre is located and those that belong to the 47th Brigade are used to supply Hezbollah and Iranian militias with ammunition.

The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said three members of Iran-backed militias were killed and 10 others injured in "Israeli airstrikes on four positions in Homs and Hama".

It said there was "information regarding casualties of non-Syrian people".

"The Israeli airstrikes targeted four positions in Homs and Hama countryside, targeting a weapon depot [northwest] of Hama, the administration of the 47th Brigade and a battery of the air-defence in Ma'arin Mountain, where members of the 'Iranian Revolutionary Guards' militia and Syrian and non-Syrian Iran-backed militias are stationed," the observatory said.

On 2 August, Israeli warplanes targeted border towns to the south of Homs province, without any casualties being reported.

Commenting on Friday evening's Israeli strikes, political researcher Mohammed Al-Mustafa said these raids are becoming more precise in targeting supply lines and points, aiming to obstruct the flow of weapons to the border areas.

"Military strikes of this type are considered tactical but carry political messages that Iranian movements to support Hezbollah are always under Israeli surveillance," he said, adding that the bombing methodology was "primarily political in nature" and "secondarily military".

A defected officer from the Syrian regime army said the veterinary college is huge and the regime began building it before the 2011 Syrian uprising against President Bashar Al-Assad, which became an armed conflict after the brutal suppression of protests by the regime.

The scientific research centre previously specialised in developing Scud missiles.