Damascus, January 26 (RHC)-- Syrian President Bashar al-Assad says the Israeli military is obviously supporting terrorist groups in Syria by conducting airstrikes in the crisis-hit country. "Whenever we make advances in some place, they (the Israelis) attack in order to undermine the army. It’s very clear," Assad said in an interview with American magazine Foreign Affairs which was published on Monday.

The Syrian leader said: "That’s why some in Syria joke, 'How can you say that al-Qaeda doesn’t have an air force? They have the Israeli air force'." His remarks came a week after an Israeli aircraft fired two missiles at the village of Quneitra in the Syrian Golan Heights bordering Lebanon.

Six members of the Lebanese resistant movement Hezbollah and a senior commander of Iran's Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) were killed in the attack. Iran's Brigadier General Mohammad Ali Allahdadi had traveled to Syria to provide consultation and help the Syrian government and nation counter the Takfiri terrorists in the country.

The Tel Aviv regime has carried out several airstrikes in Syria since the start of the nearly four-year-old foreign-sponsored militancy there. Damascus says Tel Aviv and its Western allies are aiding the extremist terror groups operating inside Syria since March 2011.