Palestinian militant group: The commander was killed in Syria

DAMASCUS — A commander of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad armed group was killed in Syria on Sunday in an attack by Israeli agents.

The Al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Jihad group, announced in a statement that 31-year-old Ali Ramzi al-Aswad was killed Sunday morning in the countryside of Damascus in a “cowardly attack with bullets bearing the fingerprints of the Zionist enemy. ”, referring to Israel.

Israel did not immediately comment on Sunday’s suspected attack.

According to a statement from Islamic Jihad, Aswad’s family was displaced from the city of Haifa in 1948 and settled in refugee camps in Syria, where he joined the organization as a youth.

In 2019, Israeli warplanes fired missiles at the home of Akram al-Ajouri, an exiled member of the Islamic Jihad leadership. Ajouri was not injured, but her son was reportedly killed in the attack.

Airstrikes on residential areas in Damascus last month, which Syrian officials said killed at least five people, were attributed to Israel. In a statement, an Islamic Jihad official warned Israel that “they will give a firm response without delay to the assassination of the leaders of the resistance.”

Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes in government-controlled parts of Syria in recent years, including airports in Damascus and Aleppo, but rarely acknowledges or discusses the operations.