A deadly bombing at a church near Damascus that killed at least 25 people was carried out by a Daesh sleeper cell, which had also plotted attacks on a Shiite shrine and a crowded gathering in the capital, Syria’s Interior Ministry said Tuesday.
Sunday’s attack on Mar Elias Church marked the first of its kind in Syria in years, as the capital seeks to stabilize and restore normalcy amid lingering conflict and divisions.
Interior Ministry spokesman Noureddine Al-Baba told reporters that a second attacker was detained Monday en route to carry out an attack on the Sayyida Zeinab shrine, a major religious site in southern Damascus. He said a third operation was also foiled, involving a planned bombing in a densely populated area using a motorcycle.
Al-Baba said security forces seized weapons and explosives from Daesh hideouts and tracked down the leader of the sleeper cell through the interrogation of the detained suspect.
The suicide bomber behind the church attack was not Syrian, he added, without providing further details.
The cell’s ringleader, Mohammad Abdelillah al-Jumaili, was described as a key Daesh figure responsible for recruiting terrorists from the Al-Hol camp in northeastern Syria, which houses thousands of Daesh-linked individuals and is controlled by U.S.-backed PKK/YPG terrorists.
Funerals for the victims were held at the Church of the Holy Cross in Damascus. Church bells rang as mourners carried white coffins through the crowd, many of whom wept openly. Clergy declared the victims martyrs, and attendees called for unity and peace.
