The Latest on developments in Syria
Israel’s military says it has struck a Syrian target after a shell launched from there landed inside the buffer zone at the border.
The military said in a statement Friday that
“it will continue to implement the 1974 Separation of Forces Agreement that includes maintaining the buffer zone.”
Israeli leaders have made clear recently they expect President Bashar Assad and his allies to honor the decades-old agreement that sets out a demilitarized zone along the frontier and limits the number of forces each side can deploy within 15 miles (9 kilometers) of the zone.
The military said the shell was spillover fire from fighting between the Syrian government and rebel forces.
Israel has mostly stayed out of Syria’s civil war, which is raging near its northern frontier.
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Syrian state media says government forces have reached a vital border crossing with Jordan and raised the national flag for the first time in years.
State news agency SANA said the capture of the Naseeb border crossing happened Friday afternoon after a deal was reached between rebels and Russian mediators to end the violence in southern Syria.
The capture of the Naseeb border crossing is another victory for President Bashar Assad’s forces, who have regained control of most of the area’s key cities from insurgents.
Rebels seized control of the crossing in 2015, cutting a major lifeline for Syrian exports and disrupting a major trade route between Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and oil-rich gulf counties.
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Syrian state media and a war monitor say government forces have captured new areas along the border with Jordan and are on the verge of reaching a main crossing between the two countries.
Government-controlled Central Military Media said Friday that government forces now control most of the towns and villages on the eastern side of southern Daraa province and should capture the Naseeb border crossing within hours.
Syrian government forces launched a wide offensive on June 19 to retake Daraa and the nearby Quneitra region that borders the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. The attack has displaced some 330,000 people and left dozens dead.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Right says Syrian troops are now about three kilometers (2 miles) from Naseeb border crossing.
Source
The The Associated Press (AP)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday he will press German and French leaders next week to support his position that Iran should have no military presence in neighbouring Syria.
Netanyahu will travel to Germany and France for talks expected to focus on the US decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal — long sought by Israel — and the Iranian presence in Syria.
He will meet French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel on the June 4-6 trip. Netanyahu said he may also meet British Prime Minister Theresa May.
“We believe that there is absolutely no room for any Iranian military presence in any part of Syria,” Netanyahu told senior officials from his Likud party, according to a statement from his office.
“These things, of course, reflect not only our position. I can safely say that they also reflect the views of others in the Middle East and beyond the Middle East. This will be the main focus of my discussions.”
Israel has been pledging for months to prevent its main enemy Iran from entrenching itself militarily in Syria, where Tehran is backing President Bashar al-Assad’s regime.
Earlier this month, Israel launched a large-scale attack on what it said were Iranian targets in Syria, raising fears of a major confrontation.
Those strikes followed a barrage of rockets that Israel said was fired toward its forces in the occupied Golan Heights by Iran from Syria.
Even before that, Israel had been blamed for a series of recent strikes inside Syria that killed Iranians, though it has not acknowledged them.
Israel argues the lifting of sanctions under the nuclear deal allowed Iran to expand its presence in the Middle East, both through its own forces and with proxy groups.
It also says the time limits on the accord do not guarantee Iran will not eventually obtain nuclear weapons, while it also wants to see restrictions on Iranian missile development.
Trump announced on May 8 that the United States was pulling out of the agreement, but all other parties to it — Germany, France, Britain, China and Russia — say the agreement is working as intended and want to stick by it.
There have been concerns over the fallout from the White House decision and tensions in Syria.
Chagai Tzuriel, director general of Israel’s intelligence ministry, told journalists on Monday he believed recent events were convincing countries such as Russia that allowing Iran to entrench itself militarily in Syria was not worth it.
Russia is also backing Assad’s regime in Syria and Netanyahu has held a series of recent discussions with President Vladimir Putin on Iran’s presence there.
Tzuriel said that if the opportunity is not seized on and Iran is not pushed back “we are on a collision course with Iran”.
World leaders should boycott Russian President Vladimir Putin’s VIP box at next month’s World Cup opening unless he takes steps to protect Syrian civilians, Human Rights Watch said Tuesday.
Russia, which hosts the world’s most-watched sporting event for the first time this year, is a key backer of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime and arguably the most powerful broker in the seven-year-old war.
“In hosting one of the most televised events in the world, Russia is courting world public opinion and looking for respect,” HRW’s executive director, Kenneth Roth, said in a statement.
“World leaders should signal to President Putin that unless he changes track and acts to end atrocities by Russian and Syrian forces in Syria, they won’t be in their seats in the VIP box with him on opening night.”
Billions of people worldwide are expected to watch the World Cup on television and HRW argued that Moscow’s responsibility in the suffering of Syrian civilians should not be forgotten.
Russia is the main exporter of weaponry to the Syrian regime and its forces provide on-the-ground support to government forces and allied militia.
The New York-based watchdog has documented Russian-Syrian joint military operations that “have caused thousands of civilian casualties”, including recently in Eastern Ghouta near Damascus.
Roth warned that millions of other civilians faced the same fate in upcoming operations, especially in the northwestern province of Idlib that still largely escapes government control.
“World leaders should not allow a sporting event to gloss over a pattern of atrocities in Syria that now looms over two million civilians,” he said.
A wave of Israeli strikes on suspected military positions in Syria this week killed 42 people, including at least 19 Iranians, a Syria war monitor reported Saturday.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the death toll from attacks early Thursday has risen from 23 to 27, including at least 11 Iranians and six Syrian soldiers, including three officers.
Late Tuesday, Syrian state-run media said Israel struck a military outpost near the capital Damascus, saying that its air defenses intercepted and destroyed two of the incoming missiles. The Observatory said at least 15 were killed, eight of them Iranians, including a member of the Revolutionary Guards, Iran’s elite force.
This brings to 42, including 19 Iranians, the total killed during the two days of strikes.
Syria blamed Israel for the Tuesday strikes that hit near the capital. Israel said its Thursday strikes were in response to a barrage of Iranian rockets on its positions in the occupied Golan Heights, the most serious military confrontation between the two bitter enemies to date.
The escalating confrontation between Israel and Iran has raised fears the region may be sliding into an unprecedented direct conflict between the two archenemies.
Israel’s defense minister called on Syria’s President Bashar Assad on Friday to rid his country of Iranian forces based there — warning their presence will only cause more trouble to the already war-ravaged country.
Avigdor Lieberman’s comments were followed by threats from an Iranian cleric that Tel Aviv or Haifa would be in danger if Israel did “anything foolish.”
The extent of the damage inflicted by the Israeli airstrikes was not immediately clear.
Israel said its rockets on Thursday were in response to a barrage of Iranian missiles at its positions in the occupied Golan Heights on Syria’s southern borders. Israel said Iran has been deploying its allied militias in the area.
Iran said Israel’s repeated attacks are based on “fabricated” reasons. Israel, however, said it hit targets near the capital, in southern and central Syria, hitting weapons storage, logistics sites and intelligence centers used by elite Iranian forces in Syria. It also said it destroyed several Syrian air-defense systems after coming under heavy fire and that none of its warplanes were hit.
The Syrian military acknowledged that the strikes destroyed a radar station and an ammunition warehouse, and damaged a number of air defense units. It said three people were killed and two were wounded.
US President Donald Trump has attacked the judge who blocked his travel ban, saying Americans should blame the courts "if something happens". Mr Trump also said he had instructed border officials to check people entering America "very carefully".
The federal appeals court on Saturday rejected the Trump administration's request to reinstate the ban. The ban, affecting people from seven mainly-Muslim countries, was blocked by Seattle's federal judge on Friday. This means that Mr Trump's directive will remain suspended and visa holders from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen will be allowed to enter the US until the full case has been heard.
The White House and two US states challenging the ban have been given a deadline of Monday to present more arguments.
President Trump on Sunday ramped up his criticism of Judge James Robart, who blocked the ban, and the country's judiciary. In a series of tweets, Mr Trump said: "I have instructed Homeland Security to check people coming into our country VERY CAREFULLY. The courts are making the job very difficult!"
"Just cannot believe a judge would put our country in such peril. If something happens blame him and court system. People pouring in. Bad!"
The president earlier called Judge Robart's ruling "ridiculous", described him as a "so-called judge".
In its appeal, the justice department said Judge Robart had overreached by "second guessing" the president on a national security matter. It also argued that only the president could decide who can enter or stay in the US.
The two states challenging the restriction - Washington and Minnesota - argued that the ban was unconstitutional and denied people with valid entry documents the right to travel without due process.
It also violated freedom of religion rights by appearing to target Muslims, they said.
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