Three Iranians, including a Revolutionary Guards officer and at least 11 fighters allegedly belonging to armed groups close to Tehran, were killed in airstrikes in eastern Syria, which also killed a civilian World Health Organization (WHO) worker. , according to information published yesterday by a non-governmental organization and the international organization.

A previous report by the NGO spoke of 14 dead fighters near Tehran.

The bombings were launched in the province of Deir Ezzor, which is often the scene of airstrikes, mainly Israeli, sometimes American, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Asked about this by Agence France-Presse, a US government official limited himself to saying that it was not an American bombing.

For its part, Israel very rarely publicly comments on the bombings it launches on Syrian territory.

“An Iranian adviser, a member of the Revolutionary Guards, two of his Iranian bodyguards, nine Iraqi fighters and two Syrian fighters of organizations close to Tehran were killed in the strikes,” according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus tweeted the “tragic loss of one of our own in an airstrike in Syria this morning” yesterday, specifying that he was a water and sanitation engineer, Imad Shehab, who worked in Deir Ezzor.

Iran’s state news agency IRNA reported that “a member of the Quds Force”, Bahrouz Vahedi, was killed “during an attack carried out by the Zionist regime”.

The Quds Force (“Jerusalem”) is the arm in charge of foreign operations of the Revolutionary Guards, an elite force of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s military, among the closest allies of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

However, a source for the Syrian state news agency SANA in the army blamed “US occupation forces” for the attack and spoke of “seven soldiers and one civilian dead”.

“We heard loud explosions that woke us up, then the ambulance sirens,” resident Hammoud al-Jabour told AFP, adding that his home is only a hundred meters from the target site in Deir Ezzor.

“The windows of my house were smashed, electricity was cut in parts of the city and the main roads were closed,” he added.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the Revolutionary Guards officer was in a “cottage used as a communications center”, the target of the bombing, which was destroyed. Apart from him, nine other people were killed in the strike, his two female bodyguards, two Syrian fighters, four other Iraqis and the owner of the house.

Other targets were also shelled, notably in Bukamal, near the border with Iraq, where five Iraqi fighters were killed, according to the same NGO, which is based in Britain and has a wide network of sources in Syria.

Besides, more than 34 people were injured in the bombings, among them ten civilians, he added.

Since the outbreak of war in Syria in 2011, Israel has launched hundreds of raids in the country, mainly against organizations close to Tehran. The US has also targeted these organizations in eastern Syria.

Earlier this month, a member of the Revolutionary Guards and two other people were killed in an Israeli bombardment in Banias, on the Syrian coast in the Mediterranean.

The Lebanese Islamist movement Hezbollah and Iran, mainly through advisers, have provided military aid to the Syrian regime since 2011 and have a strong presence in the eastern part of the country.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a few hours before yesterday’s bombings, an Iranian transport plane that had departed from Damascus landed in Deir Ezzor. The member of the Revolutionary Guards who was killed, an officer specializing in communications, was also carrying technical equipment, the NGO added.

In early February, at least 29 fighters from organizations close to Iran, including six members of Hezbollah, were killed in Deir Ezzor and al-Mayadeen in US airstrikes, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

It was in retaliation for an attack attributed by Washington to pro-Iranian groups on a US base in Jordan, near the border with Syria and Iraq, on January 28, in which three members of the US armed forces were killed.