Israeli leaders and military officials are reportedly attending high-profile briefings on rapidly evolving events in Syria, during which Turkish-backed Islamists based in Idlib have quickly captured the major cities of Aleppo and Hama in less than a week.
Defense Minister Israel Katz and IDF Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi are closely monitoring the situation across the border as jihadists move south. “The IDF is monitoring events and preparing for all sorts of attack and defense scenarios,” the military said.
“The IDF does not allow a threat near the Syrian-Israeli border and is working to thwart any threat to the citizens of the State of Israel,” he added. Of course, Israel has long directly contributed to the destabilization of Syria through frequent airstrikes and in recent years at various times by supporting the rebellion against Assad.
There have been unconfirmed reports that one option Israel would consider is to create a buffer zone in southern Syria in the event of some sort of state collapse scenario, and if Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) were to reach Homs and eventually Damascus. Some analysts have accused Israel of covertly supporting the ongoing rampage of the HTS in the north of the country.
According to an Israeli report:
Channel 12 reports that Israel is preparing for the possibility that the Syrian army could collapse in the face of rapidly developing rebel forces.
The report says Israel has been surprised by the weakness of the Syrian army as it continues to rapidly lose ground to jihadist-led fighters. The report adds that Israel has sent a strong warning to Iran not to send weapons to Syria that could reach Lebanon’s Hezbollah terrorist group.
And an unnamed U.S. official has told Axios Thurdsays the moment HTS rebels control downtown Hama: “The Syrian armed forces aren’t really fighting.”
The official added: “We don’t think the regime is in imminent danger, but this is the biggest challenge for the Assad regime over the past decade.”
In the past 12 hours, there have been reports of a Syrian army counterattack around Hama, with some military bases in the suburbs having been withdrawn by the country’s forces.
Syrian state forces have secured Hama and are preparing for future attacks
to repel Working together, the Syrian Ground Forces and the Russian Air Force have reportedly inflicted heavy casualties on terrorists in the north pic.twitter.com/MrsrqLtI88
– RT (@RT_com) December 5, 2024
How did the security situation in the Aleppo region unravel so quickly? How or why did the Syrian army retreat so quickly?
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Below, a prominent and longtime Syrian commentator who goes to Bassem gives a quick bird’s-eye explanation…
External:
1) Russia got confused by the war in Ukraine and resources were directed there.
2) Hamas went idiotically on a suicide mission in October 2023 and indirectly drew Hizbollah into conflict and exhausted them.
3) Israel weakened Iran in Syria in recent years.
Internal:
4) Assad did nothing to improve the lives of local people. Electricity for a few hours a day, insufficient fuel for everyday things, corruption, turned the life of the Syrian business community into hell (customs, etc.), to name but a few.
5) all the time the opposition was building, changing its message, training, even Ukrainian intelligence came to support them with intelligence and drone technology.
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We should add that the US and European sanctions have devastated the Syrian economy and infrastructure, which has undoubtedly had a negative impact on the general preparedness and morale of the Syrian army. And the U.S. military has been occupying Syria’s oil and gas fields in the east for years. Part of Washington’s goal has remained to squeeze Damascus’ energy resources, further weakening the Syrian state.
