Syria: Israeli War Planes Carry Out More Than 100 Air Strikes

Israeli war planes have carried out more than 100 air strikes in Syria on December 9, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Military sites in Damascus, Daraa, Latakia and Hama have been targeted, the UK-based human rights organization says.

Israel has said the strikes are intended to stop extremists from getting hold of weapons.

The Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, says such action is necessary to ensure his country’s security.

Israel seized the Golan from Syria in the closing stages of the 1967 Six-Day War and unilaterally annexed it in 1981. The move was not recognised internationally, although the US did so unilaterally in 2019.

Following Bashar al-Assad’s regime being toppled, Israel moved in to the buffer zone with PM Benjamin Netanyahu saying the 1974 disengagement agreement with Syria had “collapsed” with the rebel takeover of the country.

The United Nations has described the move as a violation.

Now, US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller says Israel’s incursion must be “temporary”, adding that Washington will be watching to ensure Israel upholds the 1974 agreement.

Speaking this evening in Jerusalem, Benjamin Netanyahu said the Golan Heights, occupied by Israel for almost 60 years, would remain Israeli “for eternity”.

Meanwhile, huge crowds of Syrians have travelled to Sednaya prison – one of the worst prisons in the Middle East – looking for their loved ones.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken says the Islamic State group will try to use this period to re-establish capabilities in Syria.

And the Syrian rebel groups that overthrew the government say they will grant amnesty to all military personnel conscripted into the army during his rule.

The Taliban government in Afghanistan was one of the first in the world to react to the developments in Syria, congratulating the rebels and expressing hope for “Islamic government” in the country.

Taliban supporters and some of their allies were also distributing sweets in gatherings in many provinces to cheers Assad’s removal from power.

The Taliban are followers of extreme Sunni thought and jihadists. Their “ideological connections” are one of the reasons the Taliban have immense sympathy for jihadist rebels in Syria.

A senior Taliban official, working in the presidential office, wrote on his X account “the story of Kabul and Damascus is the same, both fallen on Sunday, both captured in 11 days and leaders of both countries fled”.