Israel's Syria strikes: Aiming to derail the country's future?

Despite the toppling of Bashar al-Assad’s regime just a few days ago, tensions across Syria show no signs of easing. In a gross violation of the 1974 Separation of Forces Agreement, Israeli troops entered Syrian territory, further escalating the conflict between the two states.

Israel’s military presence extends beyond the UN-designated buffer zone that separates Syrian territory from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Israeli forces have occupied strategic areas, advancing to within just 25km of Damascus, according to Reuters. Israel also continues its bombardment of Syria’s military infrastructure, further destabilising the region.

“Israel has now occupied many areas, most of which are strategic hills in Quneitra, in addition to Mount Hermon,” says Omar Alhariri, a Daraa-based a Syrian journalist, who has closely monitored the fast-changing ground developments in the country’s south for many years.

Mount Hermon, located within the UN buffer zone, offers a vantage point where Damascus can be observed from afar. Quneitra, located in southwestern Syria near the Golan Heights, is another strategically important region now under Israeli control. While Alhariri does not project an Israeli intention to advance towards big cities, he fears that Tel Aviv will “keep these sites in the future, specifically Mount Hermon, because it provides a strategic location.”

“Syrian towns in Quneitra will also be under the permanent occupation of Israel, especially the Druze town of Hadar,” the Syrian journalist tells TRT World. While some Syrian sources claim that Israel may have reached as far as Qatana, just a short distance from the Damascus International Airport, Alhariri believes that claim has not yet been confirmed on the ground.

Israel exploits authority gap

Dr Oytun Orhan, the coordinator of Levant Studies at Center for Middle Eastern Studies (ORSAM), an Ankara-based Turkish research centre, sees Israeli occupation in Syria as an opportunistic move to exploit the authority vacuum left in the wake of the country's devastating civil war. By stepping into this power gap, Israel is positioning itself to gain leverage against potential enemies in Syria and across the region, while also further isolating Lebanon’s Hezbollah from its Iranian backers.

“The dismantling of the Iranian presence in Syria with the collapse of the Assad regime is a big gain for Israel. Also the withdrawal of Shia militias from Syria is an important gain for Israel,” Orhan tells TRT World. “What Israel is now doing in Syria is to make the areas under formerly Iran-linked groups impossible for Tehran to return.”

By destroying the Syrian regime army’s capabilities from its naval and air forces to its strategic installations, Israel aims to turn the war-ravaged country into a state incapable of posing any threat to Tel Aviv, at least for the next three decades, Orhan suggests.

Alhariri shares a similar perspective, emphasising that Israel’s attacks on Syrian military targets will persist until Tel Aviv destroys all the defense capabilities of the war-ravaged country. “They are destroying everything that the Syrian army had … Weapons depots, sites, radars, literally everything. When they are finished, Syria will have no army,” he says.

Israel’s Defence Minister Israel Katz has already promised that Tel Aviv would "destroy heavy strategic weapons throughout Syria, including surface-to-air missiles, air defence systems, surface-to-surface missiles, cruise missiles, long-range rockets, and coastal missiles".

To date, Israel has conducted more than 200 raids on Syrian military targets, leaving much of the country’s military infrastructure in ruins, according to regional security sources. Just this morning Israel hit Syria military airbases, destroying dozens of helicopters and jets, as well as Republican Guard assets in and around Damascus.

Poisoning ties

Israel’s occupation of Syrian territory has drawn sharp condemnation from Ankara, Riyadh, Cairo, and several other Arab states, as well as from the United Nations.

“At this sensitive time when the possibility of achieving peace and stability, which the Syrian people have longed for for many years, has emerged, Israel is once again displaying its occupation mentality,” said a Turkish foreign ministry statement.

Saudi Arabia has echoed similar concerns, calling Israel's occupation of the buffer zone a deliberate attempt to “sabotage Syria's chances of regaining security, stability and territorial integrity."

“Israel is sowing the seeds of new problems by invading Syria,” says Orhan, who assesses that Tel Aviv will seek further support from the upcoming Trump administration to legitimise its new occupations in Syria. “Israel’s new occupations in Syria will be a cause of conflict between Tel Aviv and Damascus in the future,” he adds.

Israel’s hardliner Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who made a court appearance today on his corruption charges, used a vague language to describe his army’s occupation in Syria saying that it is “a temporary defensive position until a suitable arrangement is found.” Israel denies that its forces have moved beyond the demilitarised buffer zone.

Interestingly, while Netanyahu’s English-language statement included the word “temporary”, which could be aimed at appeasing Western audiences, his statement in Hebrew omitted that term entirely, hinting at a potentially more permanent occupation.

The US State Department issued a statement supporting the Israeli invasion of Syria. "The Syrian army abandoned its positions in the area around the negotiated Israeli-Syrian buffer zone, which potentially creates a vacuum that could have been filled by terrorist organisations that would threaten the state of Israel," said Matthew Miller, the state department spokesman.

This statement suggests that the US and the West may be prepared to accept another Israeli fait accompli in Syria in the name of defending Israeli security. According to the Washington Post, Israel informed the US of its recent occupation of Syrian territory.

Orhan points out that the current leadership in Damascus, made up of a coalition of non-state actors, is struggling to consolidate control over Syria in the aftermath of the civil war. With limited military capacity, Damascus was unable to counter Israeli airstrikes even during the Assad regime – and is now even less capable of defending itself.