JERUSALEM - Israel intervened militarily in Syria's complex civil war early Wednesday, launching an air assault that destroyed either a convoy of anti-aircraft missiles that were bound for Lebanon or a scientific research center near Damascus that previously had been the target of rebel groups.
Precise details of what took place were difficult to come by. The Israeli government didn't officially acknowledge the attack. Regional intelligence officials familiar with the assault said the target had been an arms convoy that was traveling toward Lebanon on the main highway linking Damascus with Beirut.
The Syrian government added to the confusion late Wednesday by claiming that Israeli warplanes had struck what it called a scientific research center in Jamraya in the Damascus countryside and denying that any convoy had been struck.
"The aggression resulted in considerable material damages and destruction to the building, in addition to a vehicular development center and a garage," the official Syrian Arab News Agency said. Two workers were killed and five wounded, according to SANA.
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U.S. officials in Washington declined to comment.
As with much of what takes place in Syria, there were few sources of independent information to help explain the events. Rami Abdurrahman, the head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a London-based group that tracks violence in Syria, said he confirmed that an airstrike took place in the Jamraya area, about 20 miles west of Damascus on the road to Beirut, but that he hadn't yet determined what the target had been.
What was certain, however, was that Israel, whose officials have expressed concern for months that Syrian weapons would fall into the hands of either Lebanon's Hezbollah militant group or al-Qaida-linked Islamists among Syria's rebel groups, felt compelled to act.
Indeed, Israel's action was considered serious enough that the country's military intelligence chief, Maj. Gen. Aviv Kochavi, traveled to Washington earlier this week to discuss the move in advance.
An Israeli intelligence officer, based on the country's northern border, told McClatchy that the target of the attack had been Russian-made SA-17 anti-aircraft missiles and other weapons systems that were being taken from Syria into Lebanon.
He said the weapons, which included advanced electronic systems that could disable a variety of Israeli aircraft, would have been a "game changer" had they fallen under Hezbollah's control.
According to the version of events circulating in Israel, the air attack occurred shortly before dawn Wednesday, but it wasn't clear whether it had taken place in Lebanon or Syria.
The Reuters news agency quoted a rebel fighter in Syria as saying that the airstrike happened three miles south of where the Damascus-Beirut highway crosses the border, placing it in Syria. The Syrian government's version of events clearly placed the attack in Syria.
