Israeli troops interrogate civilians during new incursion in south Syria
The Israeli army entered the town of Suwaysa and nearby villages with its vehicles under the cover of intensive reconnaissance flights
The Israeli army pushed deeper into southern Syria’s Quneitra governorate on 5 March, entering several villages, cutting off roads, and interrogating residents.
Israeli troops entered the town of Suwaysa and the nearby villages of Rasm al-Manbatah and Al-Dawaya al-Kabira, according to Sputnik.
The soldiers were there for two hours, “asking residents questions and interrogating them, before withdrawing,” local sources told the Daraa24 outlet. Last month, people in Suwaysa staged a demonstration rejecting the Israeli presence in Syria.
Occupation forces also “advanced towards the town of Majdoulia and its hospital” with “heavy military vehicles and machinery,” Al Mayadeen’s correspondent reported on Wednesday.
“This coincided with the flight of Israeli reconnaissance aircraft in the skies of Quneitra Governorate, and the incursion of Israeli forces into the town of Umm Batna in the central Quneitra countryside, and into the village of Ain al-Nouriya,” the correspondent added.
A day earlier, Israeli army vehicles entered Tal al-Mal in the southern Deraa governorate for the first time, marking the “deepest incursion” since the fall of former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s government in December.
Overnight, heavy Israeli airstrikes targeted the Al-Qutayfah area north of the capital, Damascus. Israel has recently intensified its campaign of airstrikes on Syria that began after 8 December, targeting what it says are military sites of the former government.
Israeli occupation forces swept across southern Syria after the ousting of Assad in December last year, moving past the demilitarized zone and expanding their decades-long illegal occupation in the country.
Tel Aviv has since continued to expand its occupation in Syria and has begun building at least seven permanent military sites in the southern region of the country. Israel has said its occupation in Syria will be indefinite.
Last month, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu demanded the “complete demilitarization of southern Syria.”
The statement caused unrest, and the people of Suwayda and other areas in south Syria took to the streets to protest Israel’s occupation inside the country.