A top adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei threatened Israel Tuesday over a deadly airstrike in Syria attributed to the Israeli military.
“The crimes will not remain unanswered,” Ali Akbar Velayati said during a visit to Syria, according to the official Islamic Republic News Agency.
Earlier in the day, Iranian media reported that seven members of the country’s military were killed in the strike. One was named as a colonel in the air force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The target of the reported airstrike was the Tiyas air base — also known as the T-4 air base — outside Palmyra in central Syria. Israel has previously carried out at least one explicitly acknowledged attack on the base, which it said was home to an Iranian drone program.
Israel has refused to comment on the attack, for which it has also been blamed by Russia and Syria.
Separately, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif claimed the alleged Israeli strike was carried out to overshadow gains made by Iranian-backed Syrian forces in the Damascus suburbs against rebels opposing President Bashar Assad.
“The Zionist regime and the US have in different stages rushed to the scene to boost the morale of terrorists,” he said, according to Iran’s Press TV.
“Whenever the terrorists face defeats, the Zionist regime launches operations and so do the Americans,” Zarif added.
Repeating earlier Iranian claims, he said that the US and Israel were assisting Islamic State jihadists, including by helping them relocate from areas where they were defeated.
He also said the US was “seeking a pretext for intervention” in Syria, in reference to the alleged chemical attack in Douma over the weekend that killed dozens.
Syria and its allies have denied using chemical weapons in the attack, over which US President Donald Trump has threatened to retaliate.
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