Syria has denounced an Israeli strike in the village of Beit Jinn, southwest of Damascus, which reportedly hit a civilian vehicle and injured several people. The Syrian government has labeled the attack, the second known Israeli strike on its territory in the past week, as a violation of its sovereignty and international law.
According to the Israeli military, the strike targeted a "terrorist" who was in the "final stages" of preparing attacks that posed an immediate threat to soldiers. This incident occurred days after reports of an Israeli strike on a military airbase near the Turkish border.
Following the earlier attack, the United States issued a rare public criticism of Israel, describing the strike as an "unnecessary escalation that does not advance regional stability." U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack suggested in an interview that the strike might have been an attempt by Israel to provoke Turkey into a conflict ahead of upcoming Israeli elections. These remarks were met with a response from Israel's Defense Minister Israel Katz, who called Barrack's account "full of inaccuracies" and stated that Israeli forces were acting based on "clear intelligence information about Turkey's intentions."
In the aftermath of the strikes on Abu al-Duhur airbase, the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a statement asserting that Israel and Syria had an agreement on security matters, which Syria was allegedly on the verge of breaching by allowing Turkish troops to deploy at an airbase near Aleppo.