The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Thursday that 10 people, mostly civilians, were killed in Israeli shelling in Qusayr, Syria, near the border with Lebanon, while Israel’s armed forces said they targeted Hezbollah “weapons depots”.

The NGO, based in Britain and with a wide network of sources in Syria, spoke of three bombings in Qusayr, where Hezbollah has a strong presence, as well as in adjacent areas, while later speaking of new bombings in the same area.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, one raid targeted a “weapons warehouse and fuel storage facility in the Qusair industrial zone” and left ten dead, seven civilians and three Syrian fighters affiliated with the Lebanese Hezbollah.

Other warehouses on the Syrian-Lebanese border and a bridge south of the city were also targeted, according to the NGO.

The Israeli armed forces said in a statement that they targeted “weapons depots and command centers used by the Ar Radwan force,” an elite Hezbollah unit.

They added that “in recent months” they had launched strikes to “reduce arms transfers from Iran to Hezbollah in Lebanon through Syria.”

“The Israeli attack caused damage to the industrial zone and residential districts of Qusair, in the province of Homs” (center), reported the official Syrian news agency SANA.

Israel has intensified its bombardment in recent days in areas of the Lebanese-Syrian border where crossings are located, disabling the two main crossings.

It is alleged that Hezbollah used them to procure weapons through Syria.

More than half a million people fled Lebanon and fled to Syria after firefights between Hezbollah and Israel turned into war on September 23, according to Lebanese authorities.

Since the outbreak of war in Syria in 2011, Israel has launched hundreds of bombings in its neighboring country, targeting the Syrian army as well as Tehran-backed groups, notably Hezbollah, which have deployed forces to support Damascus’ troops.