Israel is using the disarray in Syria to attack military targets.
Israel is using the seems to be grabbing what it views as a rare chance. After firing hundreds of airstrikes on Syrian military targets and capturing locations. Including the top of a mountain with a direct view of the capital Damascus.
Following the overthrow of the Assad regime, Syria’s command structures were in a state of chaos. With important positions seemingly left unstaffed.
According to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), since Saturday night. Israel is using theits air force and navy have carried out over 350 attacks. Eliminating between 70 and 80 percent of Syria’s strategic military assets from Damascus to Latakia.
According to the IDF, these included naval vessels, fighter planes, radar and air defense installations, and munitions caches.
“The Syrian fleet was successfully destroyed by the navy last night,” stated Defense Minister Israel Katz.
Additionally, the IDF has advanced its ground soldiers eastward from the Golan Heights. Which Israel has occupied, into a demilitarized buffer zone in Syria and, as it now acknowledges, barely beyond.
” Israel is using the Establish a sterile defense zone devoid of weapons and terrorist threats in southern Syria, without a permanent Israeli presence,” Katz claimed to have inst ructed the IDF.
The last 72 hours have “stood out even for folks who thought they had already seen everything,” according to one Israeli pundit.
Yoav Limor commented in the Israel Hayom newspaper, “It sent the Syrian military back to the beginning line, bereft of any substantial strategic capabilities – it did not deprive it of individual skills merely.”
Udi Etzion wrote on the Walla news site, “The IDF campaign to dismantle Syria’s military capability is the largest it has ever undertaken.”
Some of the assaults carried out as part of this operation were based on plans created years ago. According to comments made by former Israeli Air Force officers in internet writings.
According to one military analyst, Israel had previously identified some of the targets in the middle of the 1970s.
Israeli media reports that troops have seized sites in the Golan, including the summit of Mount Hermon. The mountain is called Jabal al-Sheikh in Arabic.
According to Kobi Michael, a researcher at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies (INSS), “the territory guarantees strategic dominance over the whole southern Syrian arena, which poses an urgent threat to Israel,” according to the Ynet news website. “The Syrian portion of the Golan is the best view point.”
Officials emphasize that since the fall of the Assad administration, Israel has been acting in its own national security interests.
According to them, the goal is to prevent weapons that the regime possessed from ending up in the wrong hands, whether those of Syrian extremist groups or its longtime adversary, the Lebanese military group Hezbollah. Assad has close allies in Hezbollah and its sponsor, Iran, who helped keep him in power during Syria’s protracted civil war.
In a video statement released on Tuesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared, “We will not allow an extremist Islamic terrorist entity to strike against Israel outside its border, putting its citizens at risk.”
Syria and Israel are officially considered enemy states because they fought against each other in the 1948, 1967, and 1973 Middle East Wars.
Syria was a major military force in the region under Bashar al-Assad. In recent years, Israel had launched hundreds of strikes against it, which were hardly ever publicly acknowledged. In order to prevent Assad from feeling compelled to react. Israel’s estimate contained a zone of deniability for both itself and Assad.
These had concentrated on stopping the passage of weapons to Hezbollah because the primary route was overland from Syria to Lebanon. As well as the production of weapons and Syrian air defense installations that threatened Israeli airplanes on missions.
After becoming Assad’s strongest ally in recent years. Israel attempted to avoid conflict with Russia and avoided major attacks that may have sparked a wider war.
According to some defense analysts. Israel did not want to undermine the Syrian government because it was afraid of the turmoil that would ensue if its opponents took control. Under its secular, Baathist government, Israel and Syria have adhered to clearly defined red lines over the years. They were known enemies.
However, a new Israeli policy was rapidly designed in response to the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham’s (HTS) rapid progress.
UN peacekeepers are still stationed in the buffer zone created in Syria after the 1973 Middle East War. And they have emphasized that Israel is currently in breach of the ceasefire. Agreement that established it by advancing its ground forces into the area.
Since the other party to the ceasefire agreement ceased to exist. Israeli officials contend that the ceasefire agreement has now fallen apart and that its actions are only restricted to self-defense and are only temporary.
Peacekeepers were “unable to move freely within the buffer zone following recent events,” according to a UN peacekeeping spokeswoman, who also stated that it was “imperative that the UN peacekeepers are permitted carry out their authorized duty without hindrance.”
“We oppose these kinds of assaults. This, in my opinion, marks a sea change for Syria.
UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric stated that its neighbors should not utilize it to invade Syria’s territory.
In their official comments, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan, Iraq, and the Arab League have all characterized it as a breach of Syria’s sovereignty and international law. As well as a land grab that took advantage of current events.
Germany and France have also criticized Israel’s activities, with Germany asking Israel and Turkey. To Syria’s north not to endanger the prospects of a peaceful transition in Syria and France calling for Israel to remove its troops from the buffer zone.
Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock stated, “We cannot allow the internal Syrian negotiation process to be torpedoed from the outside.”
Israel has been advised by the US to make sure its incursion is “temporary”.
Nonetheless, there has been widespread public support among Israelis for the nation’s preventative measures.
Given that HTS is still frequently classified as a terrorist organization. A number of media sites are highlighting the possible threat posed by Syria’s new Islamist leaders.
Amihai Attali praised Israel’s political and military organizations in the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper. Stating that they had learned a vital lesson from the fatal Hamas strikes on October 7, 2023. Which took the nation by surprise.
He wrote, “We cannot afford the privilege of trying to discern enemy motives,” which is one of the most significant lessons learned by the invasion, murder, and mass kidnappings.
“On that front, we cannot afford to make mistakes. There is no margin of error for that.
