Israel has killed at least 46 people in Gaza in one of the deadliest bombings in Syria since the war began. international

This Wednesday’s Israeli bombardment of Syria has caused an almost unprecedented number of victims since the war in Gaza began in October 2023: according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, 46 people were killed (at least 22 of them foreigners). Another 50 were injured. , with informants on the ground. Citing the Arab country’s Defense Ministry, state news agency SANA put the death toll at 36. The airstrike, which targeted several buildings in the city of Palmyra, sought to prevent the arrival of weapons to Hezbollah and ensure that the Bashar regime would limit itself to responding to Assad, an Israeli expansion of its attacks in Syria (which occur almost daily. Going) highlights. With rhetorical statements of condemnation. In fact, Damascus usually minimizes or hides its losses in these types of attacks against Hezbollah, Iranian forces and other armed groups close to Tehran. Israeli aviation has been carrying out these for years, but they have increased significantly since the increase in the area following the Hamas attack on Israeli soil a year ago and, above all, in recent weeks, in parallel with the open war. Which Israel has launched in neighboring Lebanon.

The Observatory cited a warehouse in an industrial area (inhabited by families of foreign fighters linked to Iran), a restaurant and other buildings among the targets of the bombing. He says that civilians are also among the injured. Palmyra, located northeast of Damascus, which was captured by Islamic State in 2015 and recaptured by regime troops about a year later, is home to ruins declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The current Israeli Defense Minister, Gideon Sa’ar, in September advocated “making it clear to Assad that if he wants to harm Israel’s security (…) he puts his regime at risk,” and lamented that He “missed the opportunity” to overthrow him. Iran and Hezbollah came to “save” him during the war.

Assad is more concerned about his own survival than returning to Iran and Hezbollah – which is now in crisis – having helped him a decade ago (when their future in the war looked very bleak), however, he has responded to Israeli attacks. They are in their territory and have also killed dozens of soldiers. He is more interested in strengthening his alliance with Russia – whose entry on the scene in 2015 was the real shift in his favor on the war front – and in deepening his rapprochement with the Gulf countries (funds for the destroyed Syrian economy. with). As well as in their rehabilitation in front of the West, taking advantage of the fact that the eventual return of Syrian refugees sounds very good to the ears of those European countries whose governments are hostile to the presence of foreigners, especially Muslims.

On the one hand, the Syrian leader, at the moment, cannot completely get rid of the alliance with Tehran, since it provides him with funding and at least a third of the fuel. On the other hand, it is openly preventing the border with Israel from becoming a front for attack. Moreover, both it and Moscow are effectively giving Israel a free hand for Israeli bombings against the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and Hezbollah. Assad did not join Tehran’s so-called “unity of fronts” strategy to counter the invasion of Gaza, even suppressing protests in Palestinian refugee camps. He does not forgive Hamas for associating with the rebels at the beginning of the war, which led to the expulsion of militia leaders from Syria.

smuggling routes

It is in this context that Benjamin Netanyahu’s government plans to weaken Iran and its allies, wherever they are, by systematically punishing arms delivery routes through Syria to Lebanese militias, with It is killing the militiamen and those who facilitate them. , Last week, the Israeli military announced in a statement that it had bombed weapons “smuggling routes” into Syria. A military source quoted by the Syrian state agency acknowledged “significant damage”, leaving some infrastructure such as bridges and roads unusable.

It has also done the same on the other side of the border, along the roads leading to the Syrian border in Lebanon. These are what thousands of civilians (both Syrian and Lebanese refugees) have been using to escape bombardment in more and more parts of the country since September. Their journey, laden with luggage, is now even more difficult.

The Observatory has counted 152 Israeli strikes in Syria so far this year. They have killed 303 combatants and 62 civilians. The division is illustrative: 25 members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, 55 of Hezbollah and 88 Syrians from pro-Iranian militias. The rest are mainly fighters of other nationalities (such as Iraqis) and Syrian Army soldiers.

Since September, attacks have become an almost daily reality and include the capital Damascus and Qusayr, a town a few kilometers from the Lebanese border that is considered a Hezbollah fief. In the first 10 days of November alone, eight incidents occurred in four different areas, including both official and unofficial crossings with Lebanon, according to the Observatory.

According to US media Axios, this also includes an extraordinary ground incursion by its elite forces to destroy an underground precision missile factory. This is an example of the penetration that their intelligence services have achieved, also evident in the coordinated attacks on thousands of search engines and walkie talkie In the assassination by Hezbollah or its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, and Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, in the center of the Iranian capital.