BEIRUT — Two Syrian rebel groups claimed Thursday that they had attacked President Bashar Assad’s motorcade in the capital, Damascus, as he headed to a mosque for morning prayers on Eid al-Fitr, the holiday marking the end of the holy month of Ramadan.
But the information minister, Omran al-Zoubi, dismissed the rebels’ claims, telling Syrian state television: “The news is wholly untrue.”
Video released by rebel groups showed smoke rising over Malki, the upscale neighborhood in central Damascus where Assad lives and where, in calmer times, he was known for driving his own car. The area has been relatively untouched by the occasional rebel shells that reach central Damascus, which is largely cordoned off from the fighting by government checkpoints.
If the rebels’ claims are true, the attack would be the closest call known for Assad during the conflict. Last summer, four of his top officials were killed in a rebel bombing, and shells have periodically landed close to some of his many residences, but Assad is not known to have come under fire. If the rebels did manage to target and hit a moving motorcade, it would signal an unusual tactical feat or perhaps new weapons more precise than the usual rockets and mortars, as well as good intelligence.
Al Arabiya, a news broadcaster based in Dubai, quoted one rebel group, Tahrir al-Sham Brigade, a unit of the Free Syrian Army, as saying in a statement: “After conducting reconnaissance on the timing and course of Bashar al-Assad’s motorcade the area was hit with artillery. We pray to God and await the field report about the results.”
Al Arabiya also quoted Islam Alloush, a rebel with another group, Liwa al-Islam Brigade, as saying fighters had fired rockets at Assad’s motorcade near the Dedeman Damascus Hotel.
“Assad was not hit, but the information we have based from sources within the regime is that there were casualties within his entourage,” the statement said.
Syrian state television showed Assad next to Syria’s grand mufti, Ahmad Badr Eddin Hassoun, standing and praying in a row of men in suits. It was unclear whether the footage was new.
Zoubi said Assad had driven himself to the mosque as usual, adding that Al Arabiya should fire “the administrative staff that supervised this false news.”
In a possible sign of greater support for the rebels from an Arab country on Thursday, Jordan allowed the leader of Syria’s main opposition group to cross into Syria from Jordanian territory for the first time, news agencies reported.
Ahmad al-Jarba, the new president of the group, National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces, crossed into Daraa province, a contested border area, to attend Eid prayers at a mosque. Jordan has backed units of the Free Syrian Army operating in Daraa, but Jarba’s visit, which probably required approval from Jordanian authorities, was seen by Syrian opposition figures as reflecting a shift in Amman toward more public support for Assad’s opponents.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition group based in Britain, reported that two mortar shells had fallen in the Kafar Souseh neighborhood, on the outskirts of Damascus, and that another had fallen in Assad’s neighborhood, Malki. No casualties were reported, it said.
In a report Thursday afternoon, the Syrian state news agency, SANA, said rebels had attacked the southern Damascus suburb of Sayeda Zeinab, home to a shrine to a granddaughter of the Prophet Muhammad.
Five people, including a child, were killed and 12 others wounded in the attack, the agency reported, quoting a police official who said two mortar shells had fallen near the Shirazi Hotel and a nearby building.