Syrian security forces arrest members of Hezbollah 'terror cell' following rockets attacks on Damascus

Security forces arrested members of a terror cell responsible for rocket attacks targeting the Mezzeh district of Damascus last month, the Syrian Interior Ministry announced on Sunday, claiming that the weapons used in the attack originated from the Lebanese terror organization Hezbollah. 

In a statement released on Telegram, the ministry said that security forces working with the General Intelligence Directorate “carried out a series of operations targeting a terror cell involved in carrying out several attacks on the Mezzeh area and its military airport,” noting that “the cell was completely dismantled and all its members arrested.” 

The Shiite Muslim Hezbollah, due to its ties to the Islamic Republic of Iran, was a prominent ally of former President Bashar al-Assad, joining the Civil War in Syria on his side in 2013. However, following the collapse of the Assad regime in December 2024, most Hezbollah forces left Syria for Lebanon. 

The new Syrian government is dominated by members of former Sunni Islamist terror groups, which fought many bloody battles with Hezbollah and its allied Iranian proxies throughout the civil war. After toppling the Assad regime, it has launched a campaign to end the rampant weapon smuggling along the Lebanese border.

The ministry claimed that the arrests came after several weeks of surveillance to determine the rocket launch sites, which led them to the Darayya and Kafr Souseh areas of Damascus. In a series of raids, the security forces seized members of the cell and “a number of drones that were prepared for use in terror attacks,” the ministry said in the statement. 

Darayya was the scene of intense conflict between the Assad regime and rebel forces during the Syrian Civil War, becoming almost completely uninhabited following intense fighting in 2016. Much of the neighborhood still lies in ruins. 

“Initial investigations with those arrested revealed their links to foreign entities, and that the source of the rockets and launch platforms used in the attacks, as well as the seized drones, is the Lebanese militia Hezbollah,” the statement continued. 

Hezbollah denied any connection to the apprehended fighters, claiming it has no presence in Syria. 

Last month, Syrian authorities announced that three rockets had struck the Mezzeh district without causing any casualties. One reportedly hit the dome of the Al-Muhammadi Mosque, another struck a telecommunications building, while the third landed near the Mezzeh military airport. 

At the time, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that “top-level leaders of the new regime" reside in the neighborhood adjacent to the mosque, making them a potential target for the attacks. 

Nearly two months ago, on Dec. 9, the Syrian state news agency SANA reported that the area surrounding the Mezzeh military airport was targeted by "three shells of unknown origin, causing no injuries or material damage.” 

A month before that, a woman was injured when a rocket attack hit a house in the area. SANA quoted a military source at the time as saying that the attack was carried out “by rockets launched from a mobile platform.”