Iranian general denies smuggling arms to Syria

A top Iranian general said any arms Israel targeted in Syria did not come from the Islamic republic, in remarks published on the Revolutionary Guards website on Monday. Brigadier General Masoud Jazayeri "denied Western and Israeli media reports that an Iranian weapons depot has been targeted in Syria," the website reported. "The Syrian government does not need Iran's military aid, and these sorts of reports are propaganda and psychological war," added the deputy chief of the armed forces. A senior Israeli source said the Jewish state carried out an air strike near Damascus before dawn on Sunday, targeting Iranian missiles destined for Lebanon's Hezbollah in the second such raid on Syria in three days. The attack targeted a facility just northwest of the Syrian capital, very close to the site of a similar attack late in January which was implicitly confirmed by Israel, the source said. He also confirmed Israel was behind an earlier strike on a target very close to Damascus airport which took place early on Friday, which also struck Iranian arms destined for the Lebanese Shiite movement. Iran's Defence Minister General Ahmad Vahidi on Monday urged the international community to stop Israel from carrying out such attacks. Unless they are halted, "events may occur in the region in which the Zionist regime (Israel) and the US would not be victorious," said Vahidi. "Certainly the Syrian government in an appropriate time will respond to the Zionist regime. The Zionist regime will receive decisive responses from Syria," he added. Iran has remained a steadfast ally of President Bashar al-Assad's regime throughout the Syrian conflict which has killed more than 70,000 people since it erupted in March 2011.