Iran launches missile attack against Isis in Syria to avenge Tehran twin attacks

The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said on Sunday (18 June) that it killed "a large number" of Isis militants in Syria's Deir ez-Zor province after it launched several missiles to avenge the recent twin attacks in Tehran on 7 June.

The attacks on Iran's parliament and the Mausoleum of Ayatollah Khomeini killed nearly 17 people and left scores wounded. "The spilling of any pure blood will not go unanswered," the armed force reportedly said in a statement published on its Sepahnews website.

Elaborating on the missile attack, the force said they fired "a number of mid-range ground-to-ground missiles" from the IRGC aerospace force's bases in Iran's western provinces of Kermanshah and Kurdistan.

The attacks targeted Isis command bases and other facilities in the eastern Syrian province of Deir ez-Zor. "A large number of terrorists were killed and weapons destroyed" in the attack, they added.

The attacks also targeted Isis' suicide car bomb factories. Isis had claimed responsibility for the recent attacks that were carried out by suicide car bombers, Tasnim news agency reported.

"The punitive and retaliatory move has conveyed a clear message to Takfiri terrorists and their regional and trans-regional sponsors" that such evil acts will be retaliated, the IRGC stated.

Several leaders of the Shia country had reportedly blamed Sunni Saudi Arabia for encouraging terrorist incidents and groups against their country.

The missile attack on another territory outside Iran — a first for the Middle East nation in the past 30 years — came soon after their supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei vowed that the country would "slap its enemies" in honour of the victims' families, referring to people killed in the Tehran attacks as well as innocent citizens of Iraq and Syria, Al Jazeera wrote, citing a statement by the leader on his website.