“… The Russian ships have been positioned in the south Caspian Sea, meaning the likely flight path for missiles into Syria would cross over both Iran and Iraq”.
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The Russian Defense Ministry posted a graphic on its website showing 26 missiles overflying Iran and Iraq before striking inside Syria.
Although Moscow admitted it struck non-ISIL targets, calling them “other” terrorist groups, it continues to assert that there have been no Syrian civilian casualties during any of its operations.
Maj-Gen Igor Konashenkov, a military spokesman, said Russia’s airforce had made 64 deployments against 55 Islamic State (Isis) targets in Syria in the past 24 hours.
BEIRUT-Islamic State group fighters advanced Friday on Syria’s second city Aleppo despite 10 days of Russian air strikes that Moscow says are aimed at routing the jihadists.
A group of mainstream rebels and al-Qaida’s Syrian branch, the Nusra Front, are operating in Hama and the northern Idlib provinces, and this is where the fighting is concentrated.
Another United States official said the missiles that landed in Iran were Kalibr-NK cruise missiles, which Russian Federation had “used for the first time in a combat setting”.
In January, Brig. Gen. Mohammad Ali Allahdadi was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Syria that also killed six Lebanese Hizbollah fighters.
Iran is one of Syrian President Bashar Assad’s main allies.
“IS has never been so close to the city of Aleppo, and this is its biggest advance towards” Syria’s pre-war commercial capital, Abdel Rahman said.
“This will have consequences for Russian Federation itself which is rightly fearful of attacks”.
Carter’s stop in London is his last in a weeklong trip across Europe, meeting with defense officials in Madrid and Rome as well as attending a North Atlantic Treaty Organisation meeting of defense ministers.
The Melkite Greek Catholic archbishop of Aleppo Jean-Clement Jeanbart on Thursday welcomed Moscow’s intervention, which he told Swiss television “serves the Christians’ cause”.
Kweiras base is about 50km away from the area of the Daesh offensive Thursday night.
The Combined Joint Task Force said the Syria strikes hit tactical units near al-Hasakah, Ar Raqqah, Manbij, and Mar’a and also destroyed tactical vehicles and a building belonging to Islamic State in those areas.
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A senior Saudi official has told the BBC that his country is responding to the recent Russian air strikes on Syrian rebels by stepping up its supplies of lethal weapons to three different rebel groups.
