The Israeli military said on Sunday that it has been conducting “operational raids” in recent weeks on Mount Hermon in Syria, continuing a military campaign on Syrian soil that is drawing increasing international condemnation.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based Syrian war monitor, on Sunday also reported airstrikes around the Syrian capital, Damascus, attributing them to the Israeli military. The strikes targeted an ammunitions warehouse used by the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, who was ousted in a rebel offensive last month, the observatory said. The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the airstrikes.
Israel’s continued military operations in Syria, which it said on Sunday are intended to “strengthen the defense of Israel’s citizens,” have drawn accusations from the United Nations and some member states that Israel is violating a decades-long cease-fire by sending its troops within and beyond a buffer zone between the countries.
The raids come just days after Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Sa’ar, said he had met with members of the U.N. peacekeeping mission on the border between Syria and Israel. The U.N. Disengagement Observer Force, known as UNDOF, was established by the Security Council in 1974 to maintain a cease-fire between Israeli and Syrian forces after a 1973 war and to supervise the buffer zone that agreement established.
After rebel forces in Syria last month suddenly toppled the Assad regime, Israeli ground forces advanced into and beyond the demilitarized zone, marking their first overt entry into the country in a half century and prompting the U.N. secretary general, António Guterres, to decry Israel’s violations of the 1974 agreement.
Mr. Sa’ar said in a statement that “extremist armed groups” had attacked peacekeepers in the buffer zone, violating the cease-fire. UNDOF did not immediately respond to a request for comment on those claims.
The Israeli attacks in Syria complicate a situation there that is already intensely complex, as the new Syrian leadership attempts to reconstruct a nation devastated by over a decade of civil war and gain international recognition.
Ahmed al-Shara, the rebel commander who led the coalition that toppled Mr. al-Assad and who has assumed interim leadership of the country, criticized the Israeli military’s actions in Syriain an interview with The New York Times and other news outlets in December, shortly after he took power. He said Syria would continue to abide by the 1974 cease-fire agreement, and called on the international community to make sure that Israel followed it, too.
But Israel has repeatedly signaled that it plans to remain in Syria for however long it deems necessary. When Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a December visit to Mount Hermon, which Israeli troops seized last month, he said they would remain in the country “until another arrangement is found that guarantees Israel’s security.”
His defense minister, Israel Katz, who accompanied the prime minister on the visit, said that Israel’s military presence there serves as “deterrence against the rebels in Damascus, who claim to present a moderate face but are among the most extreme Islamist movements.”
Mr. al-Shara’s rebel faction, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, was once affiliated with Al Qaeda but broke with the group in 2017. It has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, the United Nations and others, but some countries say they may consider lifting that designation. A decision, they say, will hinge on whether there is a democratic transition in Syria and if rebel leaders demonstrate respect for minority groups.
In recent weeks, Mr. al-Shara has sought to present himself as a diplomat focused on rebuilding his country, meeting with officials from the United States as well as those from European and Middle Eastern nations.
There are some indications that the new Syrian government would welcome relations with Israel as well. The newly appointed governor of Damascus, Maher Marwan, in an NPR interview in late December, called on the United States to use its sway over Israel to encourage the establishment of diplomatic relations.
For now, however, Israel appears more focused on military action.
Apart from the encroachment of Israeli ground troops in Syria, the Israeli military has also conducted intensive airstrikes there, war monitors say, both before and since the fall of Mr. al-Assad. In a report on Thursday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said it had documented more than 370 Israeli attacks in Syria last year, the majority of which came in recent weeks.
