Occupied Palestine | فلسطين

Israel military to station new unit along Syrian border: Israeli source

Israeli Chief of Staff Lt. Gen Benny Gantz (with binoculars) and other military officers overlook parts of Syria from the occupied Golan Heights. (file photo)

PressTV | Wed Jul 10, 2013 8:30PM

The Israeli regime has recently increased its military activities in the occupied Syrian territory of Golan Heights.

The Israeli military is set to deploy a new regional unit along the Syrian border in the occupied Golan Heights, a military source says.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, the Israeli military source told Xinhua on Wednesday that the new unit would be the Israeli regime’s fifth regional division to operate in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

The Israeli daily Haaretz also reported that the decision had been finalized by Israeli Chief of Staff Lt. Gen Benny Gantz earlier this week.

The regime in Tel Aviv has recently increased its military activities in the occupied Syrian territory of Golan Heights.

On June 26, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that military maneuvers may be carried out in the occupied Golan Heights in the near future, the Times of Israel reported.

The Israeli military has also been behind a number of aerial assaults on the Syrian soil over the past months.

On May 5, the Israeli military launched an airstrike on the Jamraya Research Center in a suburb of the Syrian capital Damascus.

The regime in Tel Aviv, along with the West and its other regional allies, are supporting over two years of deadly crisis plaguing Syria.

MKA/NT/MHB


Israel Attacks Syria – Background


Maan News Agency | May 4, 2013

Israeli F-16 warplanes take part in a military display marking Israel’s
60th anniversary in 2008. (AFP/Jack Guez, File)

WASHINGTON (AFP) — Israel conducted an airstrike in Syria overnight targeting a weapons shipment headed for Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, US media reported.

CNN said US and Western intelligence agencies were reviewing information suggesting Israel likely conducted a strike in the night from Thursday to Friday, just as Israel was flying many warplanes over Lebanon.

But the United States does not believe Israeli warplanes entered Syrian airspace to conduct the strikes, it added.

A senior US official told NBC News that the airstrikes were likely tied to delivery systems for chemical weapons.

White House and Pentagon officials declined to comment on the reports.

But Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina was quoted as telling an audience that Israel had indeed bombed Syria.

“Israel bombed Syria tonight,” Graham was cited by the Politico news website as saying in passing, without offering any further details.

Graham, who serves on the Senate Armed Services Committee, was speaking at the South Carolina Republican Party’s annual Silver Elephant fundraising dinner.

If confirmed, this would mark the second time that Israel has conducted airstrikes on Syria this year.

Earlier this month, it implicitly admitted carrying out a January airstrike on a weapons convoy in Syria thought to be en route to Lebanon’s Hezbollah — a long-time Damascus ally.

The reports on the latest strike came shortly after President Barack Obama nearly ruled out deploying US troops to Syria, saying he did not foresee a scenario in which that would be beneficial to the United States or Syria.

Speculation has mounted that the Obama administration could reverse its opposition to arming the rebels after the White House said last week that President Bashar Assad likely used chemical weapons on his people.

Obama has been reluctant to intervene in the war but faces mounting criticism that he has allowed the Assad regime to cross his own declared “red line” on using chemical weapons.


Syria: ‘Israeli strike’ hits Damascus army centre

Video by Al Jazeera



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