Reuters reports that a suicide bomber may have struck in the Syrian capital of Damascus but that “opposition activists” were denying it:
A car bomb killed at least three people, wounded dozens and blew the windows out of buildings in northeastern Damascus on Tuesday as rebel fighters stepped up attacks in the Syrian capital, pro-government television stations said.
The al-Ikhbariya news channel said the explosion went off near a military supply office. Addounia TV gave a preliminary toll of three people killed.
Both atrributed the blast to a suicide bomber in a car.
But opposition activists in the area said it was not clear if it was by a bomb or a mortar round.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which closely tracks the Syrian civil war, reported that the blast was caused by a suicide bomber. From the Observatory’s Facebook page:
3 people were killed by a suicide truck bomb in the Rukn al-Din neighbourhood of Damascus
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights has been remarkably accurate on its reports of suicide attacks, so when it reports that one has occurred you should listen.
Today’s suicide attack is the second in the capital in five days. On March 22, a suicide bomber killed Mohammad Said Ramadan al Bouti, a senior Sunni cleric who was a mouthpiece for President Assad.
No group has claimed credit for either of the recent attacks in Damascus at this time. The Al Nusrah Front, al Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria, has claimed credit for 57 of the 69 suicide attacks that have been reported in Syria since December 2011, according to a tally by The Long War Journal (note that multiple suicide bombers deployed in a single operation are counted as part of a single attack). So far this year, 16 suicide attacks have been reported in Syria; Al Nusrah has claimed credit for 14 of them.
