DAMASCUS: Israeli forces seized seven people during an incursion into Syria on Wednesday, Syrian state media reported, with the Israeli military saying it “apprehended” individuals “suspected of terrorist activity.”
Since the fall of longtime Syrian ruler Bashar Assad in December, Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes on Syria and occupied much of a UN-patrolled demilitarised zone on the formerly Syria-controlled side of the armistice line between the two states, technically at war since 1948.
It has also opened talks with the interim authorities in Damascus.
The official Syrian news agency SANA said the Israeli troops “entered the town of Jabata Al-Khashab” in the southern province of Quneitra at dawn, raiding homes and “detaining seven people.”
The force — about 30 soldiers in five vehicles — crossed from a nearby base at 3:00 am (0000 GMT) and withdrew two hours later after the raids.
SANA also reported Israeli shelling in Quneitra.
Responding to a request for comment from AFP’s Jerusalem bureau, the Israeli army said its troops “apprehended several individuals suspected of terrorist activity against the troops in the area of Jubata in southern Syria.”
The detainees were taken to Israel for further questioning, the military added.
Israel has carried out repeated cross-border operations since Assad’s overthrow in December, including strikes and ground raids in Syrian territory.
Last month, SANA reported an Israeli airborne raid on a site near Damascus after multiple airstrikes.
Israel did not confirm the operation, but Defense Minister Israel Katz said its forces act “in all combat zones” to safeguard security.
Israeli forces seize seven people from Syria: state media
https://arab.news/8dnn3
Israeli forces seize seven people from Syria: state media
- SANA said the Israeli troops “entered the town of Jabata Al-Khashab” at dawn, raiding homes and “detaining seven people“
- The detainees were taken to Israel for further questioning, the military said
Top Hamas leader rejects disarmament or ‘foreign rule’
- “As long as there is occupation, there is resistance. Resistance is a right of peoples under occupation” said Meshal
DOHA: A senior Hamas leader said Sunday that the Palestinian Islamist movement would not surrender its weapons nor accept foreign intervention in Gaza, pushing back against US and Israeli demands.
“Criminalizing the resistance, its weapons, and those who carried it out is something we should not accept,” Khaled Meshal said at a conference in Doha.
“As long as there is occupation, there is resistance. Resistance is a right of peoples under occupation ... something nations take pride in,” said Meshal, who previously headed the group.
Hamas, an Islamist movement, has waged an armed struggle against what it sees as Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories. It launched a deadly cross-border raid into Israel from Gaza on October 7, 2023, which triggered the latest war.
A US-brokered ceasefire in Gaza is in its second phase, which foresees that demilitarization of the territory — including the disarmament of Hamas — along with a gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces.
Hamas has repeatedly said that disarmament is a red line, although it has indicated it could consider handing over its weapons to a future Palestinian governing authority.
Israeli officials say that Hamas still has around 20,000 fighters and about 60,000 Kalashnikovs in Gaza.
A Palestinian technocratic committee has been set up with a goal of taking over the day-to-day governance in the battered Gaza Strip, but it remains unclear whether, or how, it will address the issue of demilitarization.
The committee operates under the so-called “Board of Peace,” an initiative launched by US President Donald Trump.
Originally conceived to oversee the Gaza truce and post-war reconstruction, the board’s mandate has since expanded, prompting concerns among critics that it could evolve into a rival to the United Nations.
Trump unveiled the board at the World Economic Forum in the Swiss ski resort of Davos last month, where leaders and officials from nearly two dozen countries joined him in signing its founding charter.
Alongside the Board of Peace, Trump also created a Gaza Executive Board — an advisory panel to the Palestinian technocratic committee — comprising international figures including US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, as well as former British prime minister Tony Blair.
On Sunday, Meshal urged the Board of Peace to adopt what he called a “balanced approach” that would allow for Gaza’s reconstruction and the flow of aid to its roughly 2.2 million residents, while warning that Hamas would “not accept foreign rule” over Palestinian territory.
“We adhere to our national principles and reject the logic of guardianship, external intervention, or the return of a mandate in any form,” Meshal said.
“Palestinians are to govern Palestinians. Gaza belongs to the people of Gaza and to Palestine. We will not accept foreign rule,” he added.
