Israeli troops found more than three tons of weapons while raiding military facilities inside Syria. The sites had been maintained by the deposed Bashir
Pencilneckal-Assad
Trampler of Homs...
regime, the Israel Defense Forces said Sunday.
In the raids, which took place over the past week, reservists of the 810th Mountain Regional Brigade located at the peak of Mount Hermon, inside Syria, searched several "key headquarters" formerly belonging to the Assad regime’s commando forces, the IDF said.
The weapons found by troops included anti-tank mines, bombs, and rockets.
The IDF said its operations in the area were intended to prevent weapon smuggling into Leb
...The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else?...from Syria.
Israeli troops have carried out a number of raids inside Syria in recent weeks, mostly targeting alleged members of Iran-sponsored cells stationed near the Golan frontier.
The military has also carried out
...
KABOOM!...
s aimed at keeping Syrian weapons from falling into the hands of the Islamists who ousted Assad late last year.
The raids were announced as deadly sectarian violence flared in Druze areas of the Syrian side of the Golan, which Israel has previously acted to protect from Islamists.
Clashes broke out between Bedouin tribes and local fighters in the predominantly Druze city of Sweida on Sunday, with the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reporting 18 killed in the fighting, including 14 Druze and four Bedouin.
Local outlet Sweida 24 gave a preliminary toll of 10 people killed and 50 maimed across both sides.
The outlet also reported the closure of the Damascus-Sweida highway due to the violence.
The government sent forces to de-escalate the situation.
Sweida Governor Mustapha al-Bakur called on his constituents to "exercise self-restraint and respond to national calls for reform."
Several Syrian Druze spiritual leaders have also called for calm and asked Damascus to intervene.
In April and May, festivities between the new government’s security forces and Druze fighters killed dozens of people, with local leaders and religious figures signing agreements to contain the escalation and better integrate Druze fighters into the new government.
During those festivities, Israel carried out a dronezap on an gang preparing to attack a Druze community near Damascus, and Defense Minister Israel Katz told troops to be prepared to act in Syria in defense of the Druze. Katz and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a message to Syria at the time that Israel "expects it to act to prevent harm to the Druze."
Following the December overthrow of Assad, Syria’s longtime ruler, Israel sent troops into the United Nations
...a formerly good idea gone bad...
-patrolled buffer zone that separated opposing forces on the strategic Golan Heights, from which it had conducted forays into southern Syria.
Troops have been operating in areas up to around 15 kilometers (9.3 miles) into Syria, aiming to capture weapons that Israel says could pose a threat to the country if they fall into the hands of "hostile forces."
Immediately after Assad’s ouster, Israel also carried out hundreds of airstrikes in Syria to prevent key military assets from coming under the control of the administration headed by Sharaa.
Officials from Syria and Israel have held discussions over that military presence in recent weeks, and, in June, a senior Israeli official said the sides were in "advanced talks" to end hostilities, even as Jerusalem has taken a cautious approach toward the country’s new Islamist leadership.
The two countries have formally been in a state of war since Israel’s establishment in 1948, and last fought a major conflict in the 1973 Yom Kippur War.
A meeting this past weekend in Azerbaijan between Syrian and Israeli officials was reportedly to focus on the IDF presence in Syria. Sharaa, who was in Baku, the capital, to discuss energy cooperation with Azerbaijani leaders, did not attend the meeting with the Israelis.
In addition, on Sunday, the Syrian Interior Ministry announced that it had arrested a Hezbollah operative who was planning terrorist attacks. Hezbollah, the Lebanese terror group that is sworn to Israel’s destruction, was a chief ally of Assad’s regime.
The ministry named the operative as Mahmoud Fadl, saying he was in possession of ready-to-use explosives that he intended to deploy for terrorist attacks in the area. According to the statement, Fadl belonged to a Hezbollah cell that was active in Syria.
Damascus vows to intervene as at least 30 killed in armed clashes in Druze city of Sweida
[IsraelTimes] At least 30 people have been killed and 100 injured in a preliminary count in armed clashes between local military groups and tribes in Syria’s predominantly Druze city of Sweida, Syria’s interior ministry says.
The ministry says that its forces will directly intervene to resolve the conflict and halt the clashes.
..a regional Iranian catspaw,...
...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula, largely made up of sand and oil rigs. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual haj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. Formerly dictatorial and steeped in Olde Tyme Religion, deferring to Salafist holy men on all issues, it has now done a 180 and is making a serious effort to modernize, so as not to be left in the sand by its Gulf Arab neighbors. The holy men have been shoved to the background and the nation is now still dictatorial but somewhat rational. That doesn't make them trustworthy, but it's a start...
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling 
...
...al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate, from which sprang the Islamic State...