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Israel Used a Power Vacuum to Destroy Syria's Military Assets

(Washington Post) Shira Rubin - Last week Israel effectively destroyed Syria's military capabilities in a matter of days and seized military posts beyond a UN-monitored buffer zone established after the 1973 Yom Kippur war. Avi Dichter, a member of Israel's Security Cabinet, said the goal "is to establish facts on the ground" as Syrian rebels seek to cement their rule. When Iranian military advisers and allied forces withdrew and Assad fled, the IDF followed maps annotated with suspected chemical and biological weapons facilities, armored divisions and airfields. The Security Cabinet approved a preemptive ground and aerial campaign aimed at eliminating future threats from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, Syria's leading rebel group and de facto governing authority, which began as an offshoot of al-Qaeda. Israeli officials discussed the operations with their American counterparts. U.S. officials told the Washington Post that Washington had given its blessing years ago to Israeli freedom of action in Syria, including airstrikes, as a self-defense measure, and that it extended to the present. The officials emphasized that Israel neither needed nor asked for U.S. approval or assistance for its operations in Syria since the rebel takeover. From the Israeli perspective, "the need for the buffer zone action was clear from day one," said a person familiar with Cabinet discussions. "No one wanted to see the rebels on Mount Hermon, looking down into Israel." Successive waves of strikes took out Syrian missiles, drones, fighter jets, attack helicopters, tanks, radar systems and the country's small naval fleet in the port of Latakia.
2024-12-15 00:00:00
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