The damaging interior of the Mar Elias Church after an Islamic State suicide bomb, Damascus, Syria, June 23, 2025
An Islamic State suicide bomber has killed at least 25 people, including children, and wounded at least 63 inside the Mar Elias Church on the outskirts of Syria’s capital Damascus.
The attacker struck as worshippers were praying during services on Sunday. The church’s interior was left in ruins, with pews covered in debris and blood.
While ISIS did not claim responsibility, the Syrian Interior Ministry said he was a fighter who fired at the congregation detonating himself with an explosives vest. A witness said the attacker was accompanied by two other men, who fled as he was driving near the church.
The Ministry said, “Rescue teams from the Syria Civil Defence continue to recover bodies from the scene.”
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa pledged:
We promise…that we will work night and day, mobilizing all our specialized security agencies, to capture all those who participated in and planned this heinous crime and to bring them to justice.
He said the attack “reminds us of the importance of solidarity and unity of the government and the people in facing all that threatens our nation’s security and stability”.
Interior Minister Hamza al-Mostafa echoed:
This cowardly act goes against the civic values that bring us together.
We will not back down from our commitment to equal citizenship … and we also affirm the state’s pledge to exert all its efforts to combat criminal organisations and to protect society from all attacks threatening its safety.
The UN envoy for Syria, Geir Pedersen, expressed “outrage at this heinous crime” and called for a “full investigation and action by the authorities”.
