“Colossal” explosions have filled the skies over Syria as Israeli strikes are said to have targeted military sites in the “most intense strikes” in the area for more than a decade, with explosions recorded on earthquake sensors.
A war monitoring group said Israeli strikes had targeted military sites in Syria’s coastal Tartus region.
“Israeli fighter jets launched strikes” against a number of sites, including air defense units and “surface-to-surface missile depots,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, in what it said were “the most intense strikes in the coastal region of Syria from the beginning. of strikes in 2012′.
It has been claimed that the explosion was so large that it measured a magnitude of 3.0 on seismic sensors.
Tartus has been the location of one of Russia’s two military bases in Syria and was used as a naval base as well as an ammunition depot.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry said today it had evacuated some of its diplomatic staff from Syria, a week after the fall of the nation’s dictator Bashar al-Assad.
On Wednesday, a Kremlin spokesman had said that Moscow was in contact with the new authorities in Syria about the future of its bases.
The airstrikes now raise more questions about the future of Russian assets in the country, including the Hmeimim military airfield.
Social media posts on Twitter showing what are believed to be Israeli airstrikes near Tartus in northwestern Syria.
The huge explosions are believed to show Israeli attacks on Tartus, on the Syrian coast.
Tartus was the location of a huge Russian naval base and ammunition depot in Syria.
The massive explosion sent a large cloud of smoke into the air and reportedly ignited seismometers.
After an 11-day offensive, a rebel coalition dominated by the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) overthrew Al-Assad, who fled to Russia along with his family.
Russia was a major backer of al-Assad during the Syrian Civil War, providing troops and vital air support since 2015 to push back the rebel advance and shore up support for the Baathist dictator.
Informed sources told Bloomberg yesterday that talks were already underway to ensure Russian forces could remain in the naval port of Tartus, the only Russian port in the Mediterranean.
However, satellite images taken earlier this week showed that Russia, at least for now, has abandoned its naval base in Tartus since the fall of Damascus on December 8.
Five warships were photographed in port last week, but had already left on Monday.