Yaakov Lappin
JNS, Dec. 2, 2024
“The Assad regime allowed Syria to be the Philadelphi Corridor [the Gazan area bordering Sinai used to smuggle weapons] on steroids.”
Since Nov. 27, the Syrian civil war has seen a resurgence of hostilities that directly threatens the stability of President Bashar Assad’s regime, following an offensive launched by Sunni rebels from Idlib in northwestern Syria.
The renewed fighting has seen the rebels quickly take Aleppo and advance further south, and is being closely monitored by Israel. It is already drawing in Russia, which is conducting airstrikes on the Sunni forces, while unconfirmed reports of strikes by an unidentified air force targeted positions of Iran-backed militias in Deir Ezzor, northeastern Syria, an area used by Shi’ite militias to cross into Syria from Iraq.
At the forefront of the renewed offensive against Assad’s forces is Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a Sunni Islamist organization led by the 43-year-old Abu Mohammed al-Jolani. Formerly affiliated with al-Qaeda in Syria and known as Jabhat al-Nusra before breaking ties with al-Qaeda, HTS has become the primary umbrella force challenging the Syrian government in the Idlib region.
Israel remains cautious about taking sides publicly, while preparing itself for a range of scenarios.
Lt. Col. (res.) Marco Moreno, a former senior officer in the IDF’s Human Intelligence Unit 504 who was responsible for the Lebanon and Syria arenas, and the founder and commander of “Operation Good Neighbor” from 2012 to 2016, which provided humanitarian aid to Syrians during the civil war, directly linked current events in that country with the hammer blows sustained by Hezbollah and the Shi’ite axis in neighboring Lebanon.
“The rebels have been waiting with plans for a long time, and once they saw that we weakened and harmed Hezbollah in Lebanon—and in Syria—they took advantage of the opportunity to attack,” Moreno told JNS on Sunday. …SOURCE