Syria air defence force chief killed in combat near Damascus

The chief of Syria’s air defence forces, General Hussein Isaac, has been killed in combat near Damascus, a security official said on Sunday.

The general died of wounds suffered in fighting at Mleiha, a key battleground southeast of the capital, making him one of the few top-ranking officers whose deaths have been announced during Syria’s three-year war.

The air defence forces’ headquarters is in Mleiha, a key flashpoint in current fighting around Damascus.

Because the rebels do not have an air force, the forces under Isaac’s command have rarely been deployed for air defence.

“The regime’s air defence force is to face a possible US attack, but in this war it is using its firepower against the rebels,” said Syrian Observatory for Human Rights director Rami Abdel Rahman.

The army’s entire arsenal and forces are deployed in Damascus’s war against rebels seeking to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad, whose regime brands the uprising as a foreign-backed “terrorist” plot.