Israeli military says missiles, weapons seized in raids on Syria

Jerusalem, March 9 (IANS) Israel’s military has said that it carried out raids in Syria over the past week, seizing missiles and weapons belonging to the Syrian army.

Israeli troops are continuing operations and are deployed “at strategic points in Syria,” the military said on Saturday in a statement.

“The troops located, confiscated and dismantled numerous weapons, including rifles, ammunition, missiles, and additional military equipment,” it added.

The operations, carried out by units including paratroopers and armoured forces, aimed to “eliminate any threat and strengthen the defence of the State of Israel,” the military noted.

Over the past week, the IDF said it carried out several “targeted raids” in southern Syria, during which troops captured and destroyed numerous weapons.

The IDF has described its presence in southern Syria’s buffer zone as a temporary and defensive measure, though Defence Minister Israel Katz has said that troops will remain deployed to nine army posts in the area “indefinitely”.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last month that southern Syria must be completely demilitarised, warning that Israel would not accept the presence of the forces of the new Syrian Islamist-led government near its territory.

Israel seized parts of the Golan Heights in the 1967 Middle East war and later annexed the territory in 1981, a move not recognised by most of the international community.

Since Syria’s interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa led his group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, and other militias to oust Bashar al-Assad on December 8, 2024, Israel has deployed troops to the United Nations-monitored buffer zone established in the strategic Golan Heights in 1974.

Subsequently, Israeli forces seized additional strategic points in Syria, including parts of the Syrian-controlled Golan Heights and the peak of Mount Hermon.

Earlier this week, the IDF carried out an airstrike in northwestern Syria, saying that the attack targeted a military facility belonging to the former Syrian regime in the town of Qardaha, east of Latakia, where weapons were being stored.

Late last month, the IDF said it carried out airstrikes targeting military sites containing weapons in southern Syr

Even before Assad’s fall, during Syria’s civil war, Israel carried out hundreds of strikes in the neighbouring country, mainly on government forces and Iranian-linked targets.

The same day Assad was ousted, Israel announced that its troops were entering a UN-patrolled buffer zone that separated Israeli and Syrian forces on the strategic Golan Heights.

Participants in Syria’s national dialogue conference last week affirmed their rejection of “provocative” statements by Netanyahu and urged the international community to pressure Israel to stop any “aggression and violations,” condemning “the Israeli incursion into Syrian territory”.

Israeli leaders have also publicly warned Syria’s government not to harm the Druze in southwestern Syria and have regularly spoken with foreign leaders about the importance of protecting them, along with Syria’s Kurds.

Syrian security forces deployed heavily in the Alawite heartland on the Mediterranean coast on Saturday after a war monitor reported that government and allied forces killed more than 740 civilians from the religious minority in recent days.

Residents of the region continued to report killings of civilians after deadly clashes broke out on Thursday between Syria’s new authorities and gunmen loyal to toppled president Assad, himself an Alawite.

–IANS

int/khz