Video: Warplane kills leader of key Syrian rebel group

The Syrian military has released a video claiming to show the moment its warplanes hit a meeting of a key rebel group, killing its leader and 17 others.

Zahran Alloush, head of Jaish al-Islam, was killed on Friday when an air strike hit a meeting of the group’s top officials, along with members of another rebel group, Ahrar al-Sham, in Eastern Ghouta, a suburb of the capital Damascus.

Alloush’s brother Mahmoud and 16 others were also killed, according to news sites close to the Syrian government.

Jaish al-Islam, one of the largest rebel groups fighting in Syria, has already named Alloush’s successor as Abu Hamam al-Buyedhani.

Alloush’s killing, which came amid the deaths of at least 30 high-level rebels within 48 hours according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, could be a significant moment after more than four years of grinding war.

Lahib al-Nahhas, a senior figure within the Ahrar al-Sham rebel group, told The Guardian on Friday that Alloush’s killing would be “a turning point in the history of the revolution” and that rebel groups should "realise they are facing a war of extermination and uprooting by Putin's regime".

Syria's army command reportedly said it had conducted the operation that killed Alloush as part of its "national mission".