Injured survivor recounts Israeli attack on Syria’s Beit Jinn
Iyad Daher was asleep in bed when Israeli forces descended on the southern Syrian town of Beit Jinn, wounding him with shrapnel to the neck.
“We were asleep when we were woken up at three in the morning by gunfire,” Daher told the AFP news agency from Al Mouwasat hospital in Damascus, located about 40km (25 miles) from his village.
“We went outside to see what was happening and saw the Israeli army in the village, soldiers and tanks,” Daher recalled. “Then they withdrew, the air force came – and the shells started falling.”
A man at a destroyed site following a deadly Israeli raid in Beit Jinn on Friday
Syria’s Beit Jinn residents insist Israeli raid ‘unfounded’
Al Jazeera’s Osama Bin Javaid, who recently visited an area of southern Syria near Beit Jinn where Israeli forces carried out their deadly incursion, says communities there have been dealing with similar raids over the past year.
“Israeli forces have been coming in, setting up checkpoints, carrying out raids, arresting people,” said Bin Javaid. “This is the deadliest of these incidents so far.”
He said local sources in Beit Jinn insist the attack affected civilians and was completely “unfounded”.
“Israeli forces have been saying they’re carrying out attacks against sleeper cells, against Iranian-linked groups … but this place has been always against [former President Bashar] al-Assad … and not a single shot has been fired from Syria towards Israel,” he added. “So people have been baffled by these claims.”
A damaged kitchen following an Israeli raid in the village in southern Syria
