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Suspected Jordanian airstrike kills Syrian drug trafficker on border

The airstrike coming one day after Syria’s re-admission to the Arab League reportedly killed Marai al-Ramthan, a notorious drug dealer.
A picture taken during a tour origanized by the Jordanian army shows soldiers patrolling along the border with Syria to prevent trafficking, Feb. 17, 2022.

A prominent drug trafficker in Syria was reportedly killed by a Jordanian airstrike early Monday morning inside Syrian territory, local reports said. 

The event follows Jordan threatening last week to take action against drug smuggling from Syria into its territory, as well as Syria’s readmission into the Arab League on Sunday.

What happened: The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported that Marai al-Ramthan along with his wife and six children were killed in a “likely Jordanian” airstrike in the eastern countryside of Suwayda in southern Syria near the Jordanian border. The war monitor described Ramthan as the most prominent drug dealer in the region and alleged he has connections to the Lebanese military organization Hezbollah.

Images circulated on Syrian social media purportedly showing the aftermath of the strike.

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