Beirut: At least 20 Daesh members were killed in the second failed militant bid in a month to take over an air base in eastern Syria, a monitoring group said Sunday.
“Daesh tried, starting late Saturday, to storm the air base. A total of 20 jihadists were killed in the attack, as well as two regime soldiers,” said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, referring to the Islamist militants.
Nineteen of the Daesh members were Syrian, while one was Moroccan.
They were killed in fighting and heavy army shelling.
“The withdrawing jihadists seized and took with them several anti-aircraft missiles,” said Observatory director Rami Abdul Rahman.
The attack was the second recent attempt by Daesh to take over the Deir Al Zor military air base, one of the last remaining regime positions in the eastern province.
Deir Al Zor is located on the border with Iraq, where Daesh also controls large swathes of territory.
Daesh emerged in Syria’s conflict in the spring of 2013. Since then it has declared a “caliphate” straddling Syria and Iraq.
Activists say it rules the people under its control through a reign of terror.
