ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq – An explosion near Damascus’ Palace of Justice killed at least five people and wounded 16 others, Syria’s state television said Thursday

First responders rushed to the scene of the explosion at a cafe, with state-run television reporting that the blast was caused by an improvised explosive device (IED) planted inside it.

Syria’s health ministry put the preliminary toll at four killed and 10 wounded in a statement to Syrian state media, before the state-owned broadcaster updated the toll to at least five killed and 16 wounded.

Following interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s ascent to power in December 2024, the country has seen several deadly explosions.

In December 2025, days before the turn of the year, an explosion at a mosque in Homs killed at least five people and wounded 21 others. Two months before that, in October, a blast targeting a bus of the Syrian energy ministry in Deir ez-Zor killed four government personnel and injured nine.

A car bombing in February 2025 killed at least 15 people – 14 women and one man – and injured 15 other women, according to the Syrian civil defense, identifying the victims as “farm workers” who were driving next to the vehicle rigged with explosives.

The Islamic State took over large swathes of Syrian and Iraqi territory in 2014, announcing its self-proclaimed caliphate with the Iraqi city of Mosul as its capital. They were territorially defeated with assistance from the US-led coalition forces in Iraq by 2017 and in Syria by 2019.

Despite their defeat, the extremist group still poses a potent threat through hit-and-run operations.

Many ISIS fighters who were held at previously Kurdish-controlled camps and prisons reportedly fled after a January offensive by Sharaa’s government on areas controlled by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).