Latakia port blaze finally put out after alleged Israeli barrage

The governor of Syria’s Latakia province says firefighters have managed to extinguish a large blaze that broke out at a shipping facility overnight during an alleged Israeli airstrike.

Ismail Hilal says crews are still dousing the embers but most of the fire has been put out after containers were removed, SANA reports.

Pictures released by SANA showed firefighters training hoses on stacks of blazing containers that lit up the night sky.

The news agency said the containers were carrying “engine oil and spare parts for cars and other vehicles.”

But Britain-based war monitor, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, says the cargo was “arms and munitions,” which had detonated in “powerful explosions that were felt across the city of Latakia and its suburbs.”

Syria’s state-run al-Ikhbariyah TV ran footage showing flames and smoke rising from the terminal. It reported damage to nearby residential buildings, a hospital, shops and some tourist sites near the port.

An al-Ikhbariyah TV reporter in the area said the attack appeared to have been larger than the strike earlier this month and the explosions could be heard in Tartus, another coastal city more than 80 kilometers (nearly 50 miles) away.