Israel did not assume responsibility for the air raid carried out at an unusual location near Aleppo on a strategic Syrian target on the night between May 4 and 5. The Syrians blamed the Israel Air Force for the attack, which, according to foreign media reports, targeted the Syrian Scientific Studies and Research Center in Aleppo, believed to be involved in an Iranian-backed precision missile project. Israel has been accused of other similar strikes in recent years. Unlike this week’s raid, which made headlines in the region, there appear to have been a growing number of airstrikes by unidentified planes against Syrian targets in recent months. Analysts attribute them to a significant acceleration of Israeli activity against the entrenchment of Iranian Shiite forces in the land of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Senior Israeli security sources say that for the first time since the start of Syria’s civil war in 2011 and the parallel Iranian effort to turn Syria into a launch pad for its terrorist activity and a transshipment point for sophisticated military hardware, there are indications that Iran is beginning to pull back from Syrian territory. “Activity on the smuggling front has stopped,” a senior Israeli security source told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity. “There is also a significant decline in the military presence of Iranian forces and allied Shiite militias.”

According to Israeli assessments, Iran has begun giving up on its tremendous investment in Syria of recent years. According to Western assessments, Israel has taken advantage of the novel coronavirus crisis to intensify its activity against Iranian interests in Syria and its pressure on Tehran. Unlike past attacks, most of the recent raids have been barely reported by the news media, which is wholly focused on the pandemic. The virus has provided Israel with unprecedented room to maneuver. Led by Defense Minister Naftali Bennett, Israel has stepped up its activity, which has begun bearing fruit for the first time since the epidemic broke out.

The stepped-up infrastructure attacks in Syria come as the Iranians recover from the shock of the January killing of Gen. Qasem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Israeli intelligence sources have described the assassination in Iraq as one of if not the most significant event of the past decade. Soleimani, according to Israeli and foreign defense experts, was irreplaceable. “The man was extraordinarily charismatic and an uncompromising religious zealot,” a former senior intelligence official told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity. “He would stand on a hill in his keffiyeh, a physical presence commanding the militias, giving out orders, personally overseeing the activity, and that is why things happened.”