Drone attack damages navy base building in Eilat

A naval base building in the southern Israeli city of Eilat was lightly damaged by a drone attack overnight Sunday.

The UAV was launched from Iraq and entered Israeli territory from Jordan.

Sirens sounded in the area of the Red Sea resort town around 1:30 a.m.

“IDF soldiers identified a suspicious aerial target that crossed from the east towards Israeli territory. The target fell in the area of the Gulf of Eilat. No injuries were reported and there was light damage caused to a building,” the IDF said.

On Monday afternoon, the IDF confirmed that the Eilat naval base was struck and that the incident is being investigated.

The Islamic Resistance in Iraq took responsibility for the attack, claiming it struck a “vital target” in Israel.

The umbrella group of Iranian-backed radical Shi’ite militias in Iraq and Syria is composed of Kata’ib Hezbollah, Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba and Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhadaa.

The Erbil-based Kurdish news website Rudaw describes the Islamic Resistance in Iraq as “a network of shadow Iraqi militia groups” associated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

It has attempted other attacks on Israeli territory in recent months, including launching two drones from Syria at northern Israel in early January, which were shot down by Israeli Air Force fighter jets. The Islamic Resistance in Iraq said the attacks were “in support of Gaza.”

In December, Jordanian air defenses intercepted an armed drone fired by the group that was headed towards Eilat.

The terrorist group said, “The Mujahideen of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq targeted a target in the occupied Umm al-Rashrash, Eilat with appropriate weapons,” per Rudaw. (Mujahideen means “holy fighters.”)

Jordan’s Ministry of Defense later said it shot the drone down.

Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis have also launched multiple missile and drone attacks at Eilat in support of Hamas. Most of the launches were thwarted by Israeli, U.S. or Saudi forces or missed their targets.