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As Assad falls, Israeli jets destroy his deadly arsenals before they fall to rebels
Israeli Air Force fighter jets on Sunday struck dozens of targets across Syria, taking out weaponry that Israel feared could fall into the hands of hostile forces, in light of the dramatic fall of the Bashar al-Assad regime some two weeks into a lightning offensive by rebel groups.
Also on Sunday, the Israel Defense Forces seized control of a buffer zone between the Israel-Syria border in the Golan Heights, in what it described as a temporary defensive measure.
Dozens of IAF aircraft struck numerous targets, with a focus on destroying “strategic weapons,” defense sources told The Times of Israel, describing the strikes as “very intensive.”
The weapons hit by the warplanes included advanced missile storage sites, air defense systems, and weapon production facilities, according to the defense sources. Israel also struck a chemical weapons site overnight Saturday-Sunday, according to foreign reports.
The Assad regime, which fell on Sunday after a lightning offensive by rebel forces, was an ally of the Iranian regime, and a part of its so-called Axis of Resistance against Israel.
For many years, Syria was used as a throughway for Iranian weapons, en route to terror groups including Hezbollah in Lebanon, with which Israel entered a shaky ceasefire last month.
Israel struck at least seven targets in southwest Syria on Sunday, two regional security sources told Reuters.
They included the Khalkhala air base north of Sweida city, which Syrian army troops withdrew from Saturday night. The regional sources said the army left behind a large stockpile of missiles, air defense batteries, and munitions, that were hit on Sunday.
Strikes at the Mezzeh airbase in Damascus targeted other ammunition depots, the sources told Reuters.
Footage posted to social media purported to show the large Israeli airstrikes targeting the Mezzeh airbase. The videos showed heavy bombardment of the airbase.
Later, Israel conducted another wave of at least three airstrikes in the Syrian capital, targeting a security complex and a government research center, the sources told Reuters.
Those strikes caused extensive damage to the main customs headquarters and buildings adjoining the military intelligence offices within the security complex, in the Kafr Sousa district of Damascus, the sources said, where Israel previously said Iranian scientists were developing missiles.
The research facility was also damaged, a source said.
One of the regional sources said the strikes hit infrastructure used to store sensitive military data, equipment, and guided missile parts.
Strikes were also reported in the Daraa and Suwayda Governorates, in southern Syria, according to local media.
The US also took advantage of the new reality in Syria, carrying out dozens of strikes on Islamic State targets in central Syria on Sunday.
American warplanes struck more than 75 Islamic State targets hitting the group’s leaders, operatives and camps, the US military said.
Strikes were carried out against “over 75 targets using multiple US Air Force assets, including B-52s, F-15s, and A-10s,” the US Central Command said on social media.
A senior Biden administration official told reporters on Sunday that the US was working with Mideast allies to secure and destroy chemical weapons that belonged to the recently collapsed Assad regime.
“We are taking very prudent measures about this [and] doing everything we can to ensure that those materials are not available to anyone and are cared for… We want to make sure that chlorine or things that are far worse are destroyed or secured. There are several efforts in this regard with partners in the region,” the senior US official said in a briefing.
The official didn’t specify which countries were involved in the effort.
Protecting the border
The IDF, meanwhile, issued an “urgent warning” to residents of several Syrian villages close to the Israeli border, during operations in the buffer zone between Israel and Syria.
“The fighting in your area is forcing the IDF to act and we do not intend to harm you,” Col. Avichay Adraee, the IDF’s Arabic-language spokesman said on X. “For your safety, you must stay at home and not go out until further notice.”
The warning was issued to residents of Ofaniya, Quneitra, al-Hamidiyah, Samdaniya al-Gharbiyya, and al-Qahtaniyah, all close to the Israeli border.
The IDF on Sunday seized control of the buffer zone between Israel and Syria, stressing that it was a defensive and temporary measure, given the chaos in the country following the fall of the Assad regime.
It marked the first time since the 1974 Agreement on Disengagement was signed following the Yom Kippur War that Israeli forces took up positions inside the buffer zone between Israel and Syria, though the IDF entered the zone briefly on several occasions in the past.
“We are acting first and foremost to protect our border,” said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, visiting the Golan Heights. “This area has been controlled for nearly 50 years by a buffer zone, agreed upon in 1974, the Separation of Forces Agreement. This agreement has collapsed, the Syrian soldiers have abandoned their positions.”
According to the military, Israeli troops were deployed to specific strategic positions in the buffer zone to prevent unidentified gunmen from being in the area.
Israel notified the US prior to taking control of the zone, Axios reported Sunday evening, telling the Biden administration it was a temporary move, to last only a few days or up to a few weeks.
The IDF said the deployment was carried out in coordination with the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF), which is tasked with the buffer zone. UNDOF members were, as of Sunday, staying in their positions.
The Kan public broadcaster reported Sunday that the government was considering deepening the area of IDF control further into the Golan Heights, “before someone else enters the vacuum that’s created,” citing an unnamed source familiar with the subject.
Included in the existing movements in the zone, troops from the Israeli Air Force’s elite Shaldag Unit seized the Syrian side of Mount Hermon on Sunday — located some 10 kilometers from the border — facing no resistance during the operation.
An image circulating on social media Sunday, and widely published in Hebrew media, appeared to show a group of IDF soldiers holding an Israeli flag on the mountain peak.
The Syrian government fell early Sunday in a stunning end to the 50-year rule of the Assad family, after a sudden rebel offensive sprinted across government-held territory and entered the capital in 10 days.
Syria’s civil war, which erupted in 2011 as an uprising against Assad’s rule, dragged in major outside powers, created space for jihadist militants to plot attacks around the world, and sent millions of refugees into neighboring states.
Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the strongest rebel group, is the former al Qaeda affiliate in Syria regarded by the US and others as a terrorist organization, and many Syrians remain fearful it will impose draconian Islamist rule.
HTS leader Abu Mohammed al-Golani has tried to reassure minorities that he will not interfere with them and the international community that he opposes Islamist attacks abroad. In Aleppo, which the rebels captured a week ago, there have not been reports of reprisals.
Times of Israel