|
2026-08-04 Syria-Lebanon-Iran
|
|
Israeli military clears forest land in northern Quneitra
|
[North Press] Israeli military bulldozers carried out land-clearing operations in a forested area near the village of Jbata al-Khashab in the northern countryside of Quneitra Governorate on Monday, local sources told North Press.
The sources said Israeli military vehicles cleared parts of Al-Shahar Forest, located southwest of Jbata al-Khashab along the separation line with the occupied Golan Heights.
Not occupied. Annexed. So long as Israelis are capable of holding weapons, the Arabs will not get it back, because until June 1967, the Arabs hung out at the top of the Golan ridge and shelled the Jewish farms below — more than two decades of near daily sirens, near daily of children living, learning, and playing in underground shelters, because to go outside was to risk being blown to bits. Exactly how it had been for Israeli children since 2007 in southern Israel within rocket distance of the Gaza Strip.
As for Israel’s current expansion of a buffer zone in Syria, one can only guess why Israelis would distrust the permanent goodwill of an expansionist, caliphate-seeking more-or-less branch of Al Qaeda that is currently working to consolidate its conquest of formerly Arab Socialist Syria. |
According to the sources, the operation targeted the same forest where similar clearing activities had previously been carried out by the Israeli military.
Al-Shahar Forest covers approximately 500 dunams and lies adjacent to the separation line in northern Quneitra governorate.
The dunam is a measure of area used in the lands of the former Ottoman empire, defined by the Ottomans as the amount of land that could be plowed in a single day. In Israel this is standardized to 1000 square meters or one decare. For some reason Iraq defines it as 2500 square meters.
…all civilians, and passing vehicles.
These invasions have become almost daily, extending across northern and southern Quneitra and into western Daraa. Sunday’s checkpoint is not an exceptional event, just one small part of Israel’s steadily expanding occupation of southern Syria.
This past weekend alone, on Friday, Israeli vehicles entered the vicinity of Ruwayhina Dam in northern Quneitra. On Saturday morning, another force established a checkpoint at the Wadi al-Ruqqad bridge in western Daraa and searched a civilian home. Later that day, five Israeli vehicles entered al-Ajraf in northern Quneitra, stopped and searched passers-by and installed a large surveillance camera before reportedly removing it and withdrawing.
The individual patrols may be temporary. The system of control they are creating is not.
Since seizing additional Syrian territory following Bashar al-Assad’s downfall in December 2024, Israel has constructed military positions, fortifications and roads, dug trenches, cleared agricultural and forest land and demolished civilian property. Its forces conduct home raids, detain residents, erect checkpoints and determine where Syrians may travel inside their own country.
Amnesty International has documented the repeated expulsion of Syrian families and deliberate destruction of civilian homes in Quneitra, saying these acts should be investigated as war crimes. Other documentation records the seizure and demolition of homes, mine-laying, forced displacement and the clearance of around 45 hectares of the historic Jubata al-Khashab forest.
This is occupation by accumulation: one road, checkpoint, demolition, surveillance post and military base at a time. Dividing it into hundreds of supposedly separate incidents makes a sustained territorial project appear to be a series of minor security operations.
Ordinary Syrians have shown extraordinary restraint in the face of these incursions, arrests, demolitions and seizures of their land, but anger is rising. Residents have blocked Israeli patrol routes with stones, demonstrated against the occupation and, in Abdin in June, confronted advancing troops before Israel responded with gunfire and artillery shelling. More Syrians are evidently prepared to resist.
Yet the Syrian government is walking a perilous tightrope. Any organised military retaliation could be seized upon by Israel as the pretext for a much wider war against a country whose armed forces and infrastructure it has already systematically weakened.
Israel has repeatedly threatened Syrian government forces and previously bombed Damascus under the claimed justification of “protecting” Syria’s Druze and other minorities. Damascus must therefore oppose an advancing occupation without handing Benjamin Netanyahu the confrontation he could use to escalate it—while knowing that continued restraint gives Israel more time to entrench its control.
Israel originally portrayed its advance beyond the 1974 disengagement line as a temporary security measure. It is no longer even pretending that its presence will be temporary.
In July, Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz declared that Israeli forces would remain in what Israel calls “security zones” in Syria, Lebanon and Gaza “until further notice.”
“We will not withdraw from the security zones,” he said.
US President Donald Trump reportedly asked Netanyahu to begin withdrawing from Syria, warning that Israel’s presence was increasing tensions.
Netanyahu subsequently told his security cabinet that Washington wanted withdrawals from Syria, Lebanon and Gaza—and that he intended to refuse.
There is little reason for Netanyahu to treat Trump’s request as an ultimatum. Washington has imposed no visible consequence for his refusal. On Friday, Trump openly acknowledged that his administration’s campaign against the International Criminal Court was intended partly to “defend Bibi”—Netanyahu—from prosecution.
The United States is therefore asking Netanyahu to moderate one violation of international law while actively protecting him from accountability for others. Its objections to the occupation increasingly resemble diplomatic theatre rather than meaningful pressure.
The United Nations continues to condemn Israel’s violations of Syrian sovereignty and the 1974 agreement. Human-rights organisations document possible war crimes. The ICC has issued a warrant for Netanyahu over alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza. Yet he continues to travel abroad, receive diplomatic protection and reject demands for withdrawal.
Netanyahu has learned that condemnation without enforcement imposes no cost. Israel can ignore the UN, defy Syria, reject even Washington’s requests and continue changing reality on the ground.
Sunday’s checkpoint is therefore not the whole story. It is the latest step in an occupation Israel established by stealth, is expanding in full view of the world and now openly declares it has no intention of ending.
# id) ?>
|
Posted by badanov 2026-08-04 00:00||
E-Mail||
Front Page|| [400 views ]
Top
|
|
15:51 DarthVader
15:32 NoMoreBS
14:32 badanov
14:26 Silentbrick
14:10 chris
14:06 Skidmark
13:48 Bugs the Wicked6167
13:15 badanov
13:09 DarthVader
12:57 Grom the Reflective
12:06 Grom the Reflective
11:57 Bobby
11:55 Grom the Reflective
10:47 DarthVader
10:39 Silentbrick
10:14 Bobby
10:13 badanov
10:00 Snesing Schwarzeneggar8998
09:58 Besoeker
09:45 Bobby
09:34 Warthog
09:22 Besoeker
09:17 Mercutio
09:13 Glenmore
Merry-Go-Blog
|
