An Israeli missile strike on a village inside Lebanese territory near the border with Syria killed United States-sanctioned Syrian tycoon Mohammad Baraa Qatarji, local media reported Monday. This man, whose car was targeted while he was driving on the al-Saboura highway near Damascus, is Mohammad Baraa Qatarji, according to the state-aligned newspaper al-Watan.

Qatarji was put under sanctions by U.S. Treasury in 2018 and placed on the Office Foreign Assets Control list for facilitating fuels and weapons shipment to the Syrian regime. In a 2016 trade deal between the Syrian government and ISIS, the Qatirji company was identified by OFAC as the exclusive agent for supplying oil and other commodities to ISIS-controlled areas.

The US Treasury website states: "Qatarji maintained his close ties with senior Syrian government officials in the ministries of oil and trade". He, and his two brothers, Zahed and Hussam, together with their company, were sanctioned by OFAC. The three brothers formed a militia that involved fighting with the Syrian regime in Aleppo in 2016 and are also suspected of having dealings with Hezbollah.

In separate actions earlier this year, OFAC described how Lebanese-based Syrian money exchanger Tawfiq Muhammad Sa'id al-Law provided Hezbollah with cryptocurrency digital wallets to transact on behalf of the Qatirji Company and Lebanon's interior minister revealed that a Hezbollah-connected Lebanese currency exchanger was kidnapped and murdered, apparently by Israeli intelligence operatives.