A senior Iranian official said Tuesday the Islamic Republic will respond “at the appropriate time and place” to a purported Israeli missile strike that killed several Iranian troops in Syria.

The comments by Alaeddin Boroujerdi, the chairman of the Iranian parliament’s national security committee, were the first to directly address the attack Sunday night on outposts in northern Syria, widely believed to have been carried out by Israel.

A war monitoring group and an Iranian news agency said the strikes killed more than a dozen pro-government fighters, many of them Iranians.

“Aggression of the Zionist entity against the presence of our military advisers in Syria gives us the right to respond at the appropriate place and time,” Boroujerdi said at a press conference in the Syrian capital.

The Sunday night attack in Syria sent tensions soaring between Israel and Iran. Israel is believed to be behind several strikes on Iran-linked positions in Syria in the last year, although Israeli authorities typically do not confirm or deny such attacks. Iran is a key ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad and has sent thousands of fighters to Syria to support his forces in the seven-year civil war.

Boroujerdi met with Assad in Damascus on Monday, and hailed what he called “important victories” in their shared battle.

On Monday, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said the time when Iran’s enemies can “hit and run” is over.

(AP)