The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) has announced it has deployed forces into the demilitarized buffer zone separating Israel from Syria along the Golan Heights following the “entry of armed personnel” into the area.
The announcement was made on Sunday morning via X, formerly Twitter, with the IDF adding it is “not interfering with the internal events in Syria.”
This followed the fall of the Syrian capital Damascus to rebel forces on Saturday evening and Sunday morning, with Reuters reporting that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad had fled the city. Speaking from a state television studio, a group of armed men said, “The liberation of the city of Damascus and the fall of the tyrant Bashar al-Assad.”
In its statement, the IDF said: “In accordance with the situational assessment following the recent events in Syria, including the entry of armed personnel into the buffer zone, the IDF has deployed forces in the buffer zone and in several other places necessary for its defense, to ensure the safety of the communities of the Golan Heights and the citizens of Israel.
In accordance with the situational assessment following the recent events in #Syria, including the entry of armed personnel into the buffer zone, the IDF has deployed forces in the buffer zone and in several other places necessary for its defense, to ensure the safety of the… pic.twitter.com/Nsno9GBWB4
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) December 8, 2024
“We emphasize that the IDF is not interfering with the internal events in Syria. The IDF will continue to operate as long as necessary in order to preserve the buffer zone and defend Israel and its civilians.”
The IDF did not say which group, if any, it believed the unidentified “armed personnel” belonged to. When contacted by Newsweek for comment the IDF reiterated its original statement.
Israel seized around two-thirds of the Golan Heights, situated in southwestern Syria, during their victory over Damascus in the 1967 Six-Day War. The territory is widely regarded internationally as still belonging to Syria, though the Trump administration recognized it as sovereign Israeli territory in March 2019.
The Syrian regime’s collapse began on November 27 when a number of opposition groups, led by Islamist faction Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), launched an offensive toward Aleppo which fell just days later. They then marched south taking the city of Hama and entering Homs, Syria’s third biggest city.
Meanwhile, a rebellion broke out in the southern Daraa province, which had been a hotbed for anti-Assad forces after the 2011 Arab Spring, until they were crushed by government forces. After seizing a number of towns, including Daraa itself, the rebels stormed Damascus from the south.
Christopher Furlong/GETTY
The fall of the Assad regime could be a double-edged sword for Israel. Under Assad, Syria refused to recognize Israel as a sovereign state and was a key player in Iran’s so-called “Axis of Resistance,” an anti-Israeli coalition that also included Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, Hamas in Gaza and the Houthi movement in Yemen.
However, the regime’s collapse has strengthened Sunni Islamist groups, most notably Hayat Tahrir al-Sham which is led by Abu Mohammad al-Julani, a former Al-Qaeda leader who remains the target of a $10-million U.S. State Department bounty.
Speaking to PBS Frontline in 2021, Jolani said he was radicalized in 2000 by the second intifada, an anti-Israeli uprising spearheaded by Hamas in Gaza and the West Bank. He said: “I was 17 or 18 years old at the time, and I started thinking about how I could fulfil my duties, defending a people who are oppressed by occupiers and invaders.”
Assad’s fall came after his main backers, Russia, Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah, were either distracted or weakened by other conflicts. Since February 2022, Russia has been embroiled in a brutal war against Ukraine, while Hezbollah has suffered severely over the past few months in an Israeli campaign which killed the group’s leader Hassan Nasrallah in September.
Since the Syrian Civil War erupted in 2011, Israel has periodically carried out airstrikes targeting Iranian aligned militant groups and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in the country. Israeli jets have also repeatedly targeted what they claimed were arms shipments being moved through Syria to Hezbollah.
In an editorial published on Sunday, The Jerusalem Post, one of Israel’s most influential newspapers, described the fall of Assad as “an opportunity and a risk” for the country.
The paper said: “The fall of Assad, an implacable foe of Israel who turned Syria into a staging ground for Iranian threats and weapons transfers to Hezbollah, is not something Israel would lament. However, the composition of the rebel forces threatening Assad’s regime is not an alliance that the Jewish state can applaud.”
Following the fall of Damascus, Donald Trump called for a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine in a post on his Truth Social website.
The president elect said: “Assad is gone. He has fled his country. His protector, Russia, Russia, Russia, led by Vladimir Putin, was not interested in protecting him any longer. There was no reason for Russia to be there in the first place. They lost all interest in Syria because of Ukraine, where close to 600,000 Russian soldiers lay wounded or dead, in a war that should never have started, and could go on forever.”
