Israeli Minister Elazar Stern says Syria 'must not have' chemical weapons: Report

Israel’s Intelligence Minister Elazar Stern said, on Tuesday, that Syria “must not” be allowed to possess chemical weapons, in an interview with Israeli Army Radio, AP reported. 

During the interview, Stern highlighted that their neighbour to the north should not be allowed to have chemical weapons as they would not even hesitate to use those against the people of their own country. The Israeli intelligence minister's statement comes at a time Western media has claimed that Israel struck Syria on two occasions to block Damascus' attempts of rebuilding its chemical weapons stockpile in the last two years. 

“We have a neighbour who has already proved that it doesn’t hesitate to use chemical weapons even against its own people,” the Israeli minister was quoted as saying by AP in reference to Syria. 

“(Syrian President) Assad must not have chemical weapons,” Elazar Stern added.

Israel strikes Syrian targets

Israeli warplanes carried out an air strike in Syria after midnight on June 8 in which jets fired missiles at three military targets near the Syrian cities of Damascus and Homs, The Washington Post had recently reported.

While Iranian officials have not reacted to the media report on the Israeli strikes, military affairs experts in Israel have expressed that the news report came at a time when negotiators were having a meeting to revive the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), popularly dubbed the Iran Nuclear Deal, in Vienna. 

Iran has been a supporter of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who has been accused of using chemical weapons on residents in Syria's longstanding civil war. 

The attack, as per the Washington Post report caused the death of seven soldiers including a colonel and engineer who worked at the alleged Syrian military lab. Current and former intelligence and security officials told The Washington Post that the June 8 attack was part of a campaign to stop Syria from rebuilding nuclear weapons.

Additionally, the report claimed that a similar kind of attack was carried out by Israel against Syria in 2020. The first of the two Israeli airstrikes occurred on 5 March 2020 and targeted a villa and compound in Homs, about 100 miles north of Damascus. 

(With inputs from AP, Image: Instagram/@ElazarStern)