Israel carried out a massive airstrike in Aleppo, Syria, 38 people including 5 Hezbollah members were killed.

Israeli strikes on the northern Syrian city of Aleppo have killed 38 people, including five members of the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, the deadliest attack so far in an intensified Israeli campaign against Iran’s allies in Syria. Israel has increased its airstrikes against both Hezbollah and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps in Syria since the incursion into Israel by the Iran-backed Palestinian group Hamas on October 7. Tehran and its proxies have established a foothold across Syria, including Aleppo and the capital, Damascus. Israel has repeatedly attacked international airports in both cities over the past few years to disrupt the flow of arms to Iran’s allies in the region, but the attacks have become deadlier since October 7 and Iran has been forced to withdraw its weapons from Syria. Has been forced to withdraw some of his top officials. The Syrian Defense Ministry said Israeli strikes struck several neighborhoods in the southeastern part of Aleppo province at around 1:45 a.m. (local time), killing several civilians and military personnel.

It said the airstrikes coincided with drone strikes launched from Idlib and western rural Aleppo, which the ministry described as attacks by terrorist organizations against civilians in and around Aleppo. The Israeli military declined to comment. Three security sources told Reuters the dead included five Hezbollah members. One of them was a local field commander whose brother was killed in an Israeli attack on southern Lebanon in November.

Israel and Hezbollah are exchanging fire along Lebanon’s southern border in parallel to the Gaza war. Israeli attacks on southern Lebanon have killed more than 270 Hezbollah members and 50 civilians, including medics, civilians and journalists. About a dozen Israeli soldiers and more than half of the civilians have been killed in northern Israel.