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On February 12th, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed that Israel struck Hezbollah targets in Syria on the previous day.
This is in direct contrast with the position of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), who have provided no comment or details on any such incident in the Syrian Golan Heights.
According to Haaretz, “senior defense officials say the decision not to respond to the reports on the strike stemmed from the desire to renew the policy of ambiguity of recent years.”
“We operate every day, including yesterday, against Iran and its attempts to entrench itself in the region,” Netanyahu said as he was leaving for the anti-Iran Warsaw Conference, organized by Poland and the US.
Syrian state outlet SANA reported that on February 11th, the IDF targeted Tal al-Douhor in Jabata al-Khashab, Tal al-Deria and Talet Khaled with a number of shells.
Furthermore, the military source claimed that Israeli drones launched 4 missiles on Quneitra hospital and one of the points affiliated to the security guard forces, affirming that the damages were limited to materials.
On the previous day, SANA also reported that IDF shelled Quneitra. Israeli tank shells hit a demolished hospital and an observation post in Syria’s southern Quneitra province near the border with Israel,
The incident also resulted in only material damage.
The attacks were a response to Iran, according to Netanyahu.
“Iran is issuing threats against us. On the fortieth anniversary of their revolution, they threatened to destroy Tel Aviv and Haifa. I said that they won’t succeed and if they try, it will be the last anniversary they celebrate,” Netanyahu noted
The IDF is “operating through a lot of different means and elements against their [Tehran and its allies’] attempts to arm up on nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles and entrench themselves in Syria”, Netanyahu stressed.
Netanyahu also noted that Israel’s relations with countries in the Middle East “are very good. With all of them except for Syria.” Clearly forgetting to mention Iran.
“Descriptions according to which we are disconnected [from countries around us] are the opposite of the reality. Relations are tightening. Not everything is out in the open but some of it is,” he added.
Earlier in February, Secretary of the Iranian Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani warned that if Israel continues to attack Syria, “specific measures will be taken to contain it and to respond decisively and symmetrically”.
In addition to that, in late January, second-in-command of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, Brigadier General Hossein Salami told reporters in Tehran that “Our strategy is [to wipe] Israel [off] the world’s political geography and Israel seems to be approaching this reality by its mischiefs.”
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