Israeli Safe Zone is Creeping Deeper into Syria

According to multiple sources in the area the Israeli Military is expanding its invasive Influence and Control deeper into terrorist-supported southern Syria.

After failed (ISIS) attempts to ensure its interests were safeguarded by the major players in the war next door, Israel is pushing to implement the second phase of its “safe-zone” project — an attempt to expand a buffer ranging out from the occupied Golan Heights deeper into the southern Syrian provinces of Quneitra and Daraa.

The safe zone appears intended to keep the Syrian Arab Army and its Iranian and Lebanese allies as far away from Israel’s border as possible, as well as solidify Israel’s control over the annexed oil exploration in the Syrian Golan Heights.

The humanitarian situation here is hard,” explained Abu Omar, an opposition activist who lives in the rebel-held town of Quneitra. Abu Omar said that initially the Syrian people in the area were against Israeli involvement in the area.

But, when Israel gives (bribes) “people” (read : terrorists) salaries, medication, weapons, food, and water, people start to like them, and honestly today, it is not a small number; it is a now a large number.

The Israeli regime simply bought people (corruption) with aid after systematically destroying their livelihoods. “Although not all the residents accept Israeli involvement.”

Israel started to train and equip a force of around 500 Syrian “terrorist” fighters from the Syrian rebel group, Golan Knights, as a border police force.

The border guards, responsible for the border between the safe zone and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, would monitor the area and report back to the Israelis, according to a Syrian opposition source in the area and Syrian government sources monitoring the area.

The Golan Knights have a military base located no more than a few hundred meters from the border in Syrian territory, making it relatively easy for Israeli personnel to access.

Syrian locals are not pleased with this development. “What Israel is doing now in the area is very real and very dangerous for the future here,” said Abu Ahmad, who fears Israel’s activities will be to the detriment of Syria and Syrians, citing Israel’s 22-year occupation of southern Lebanon as a precedent.

Israel has both publicly and privately voiced its concerns over what it sees as increasing Iranian influence in Syria and Hezbollah’s presence close to its northern border.

Israeli officials have been pushing for the implementation of a 40-kilometer safe zone in the south, calling on European countries to support this idea, and asking the U.S. and Russia for guarantees of its implementation.

Israeli concerns have been further heightened following a government-led offensive last month that resulted in the surrender of opposition-held Beit Jinn — which borders the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights — bringing the Syrian Arab Army and its allies closer to the Israeli-occupied territory.

Now, the extended buffer zone, or “safe zone” inside Syria, would bolster the Israeli stance that the Syrian government is not in a position to make claims of sovereignty over an area that is not even under Damascus’s control.

The push into Syrian territory is being done in tandem with an increase in Israeli activity inside the occupied Golan Heights.

The push includes expanding Israeli settlement activity; investing more in local infrastructure and the local economy; encouraging the 20,000 Syrians still living there to take Israeli citizenship and participate in local elections; and the licensing and approval of a controversial multimillion-dollar oil exploration project inside Syria— all toward the aim of cementing Israel’s hold on the Golan Heights.

With terrorist groups in Syria now searching for new sponsors (after their previous sponsors — Jordan, through its Military Operations Command, and the United States — shifted their Syria policies) Israel is now obligated to step in directly.

There are some from the Southern Front who are now working with Israel, and the same for Free Syrian Army factions, taking money and weapons,” said Abu Ahmad, the opposition activist. “Jordan stopped sending them weapons, so they turned to Israelinstead.

The success that Turkey has had in cementing its long-term influence through opposition proxies in the areas along its border, Israel is attempting to do the same in Syria’s southern territories.

So after 6 years of proxy terror, both Turkey and Israel are chopping away and annexing Syrian territories, with the UN turning a blind eye as usual. Only Russia was able to turn the tide, with the help from Iran.

An estimated 500.000 people have been killed during this so called Syrian civil war, while large parts of the Syrian infrastructure was intentionally destroyed by US-coalition air strikes, supporting the ISIS invasion on the ground.

The Intercept / AA-Magnum Analyst News 2018.