Beirut:

Syrian air defences intercepted Israeli missiles over Damascus on Sunday, Syrian state news agency SANA said.

Since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war in 2011, Israel has routinely carried out raids in Syria, mostly targeting Iranian and Lebanese Hezbollah forces as well as government troops.

“At 10:16 this evening (2016 GMT) the Israeli enemy carried out an aerial attack from the direction of the occupied Syrian Golan on some targets in the Damascus area,” SANA reported a military source as saying.

“Our air defence confronted the missiles and downed most of them,” the source added.

There was no immediate report of casualties.

The Israeli army said it did not comment on reports in foreign media.

Israeli state broadcaster Kan had reported that leaders of Israel’s security establishment met on Sunday evening to discuss an alleged Iranian attack on an Israeli-owned vessel in the Gulf of Oman this week.

Israeli Defence Minister Benny Gantz said on Saturday he believed Iran was behind the explosion Thursday on the MV Helios Ray, a vehicle carrier.

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