Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday met with military officers in territory Israel recently took control of in Syria, according to Israeli officials, in a trip that offered a further sign that Israel could solidify its hold on the newly seized ground.
The previously unannounced trip was likely to be viewed as provocative by Syria’s new leadership, which has criticized Israel’s expanded military presence across the de facto border since rebels toppled President Bashar al-Assad. Israeli forces have pushed beyond areas that the country controls in the Golan Heights and captured land including the summit of Mount Hermon, in what Israeli officials have described as a temporary security measure.
On Tuesday, Mr. Netanyahu met with Israel’s defense minister, the Israeli military chief of staff and other officials “on the Hermon ridge,” according to a statement from his office, which said they had reviewed the Israeli military’s deployment in the area “and set guidelines for the future.” His office did not specify whether he had visited areas that Israel captured this month or had stayed in areas Israel occupied after a 1967 war and later annexed.
Later on Tuesday, Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a separate statement that he, Mr. Netanyahu and other senior defense officials had visited “outposts on the peak of Mount Hermon,” confirming that Mr. Netanyahu had been to territory newly captured by Israel.
The statement offered a rationale for an ongoing Israeli presence there, saying that holding the summit of the mountain would enable the military to better observe Hezbollah militants in eastern Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley. The Israeli military must complete the construction of fortifications and arrangements for soldiers “to fully prepare for the possibility of an extended presence at the site,” Mr. Katz said, according to a statement by his spokesman, Adir Dahan.
An Israeli presence there would also deter “rebels in Damascus who claim to portray a moderate facade but are among some of the most extreme branches of Islamists,” the statement said.
The rebel group that led the ouster of Mr. al-Assad last week grew out of a branch of Al Qaeda but has sought to shed its extremist roots and project an image of stability since seizing Damascus, the Syrian capital. The leader of the group, Ahmed al-Shara, said on Monday that Israel’s new military presence inside Syria violated a 1974 armistice agreement between the countries.
In addition to taking territory in the Golan Heights and southwestern Syria, Israeli planes have over the past week conducted waves of airstrikes aimed at destroying Syrian military assets, including its navy, air force, tanks, weapons production facilities and air defense systems.
Israel seized the Golan Heights during the Arab-Israeli War of 1967, and the area is considered illegally occupied under international law.
This week, the Israeli government also approved a plan by Mr. Netanyahu to expand settlements in the part of the Golan Heights that it controls, a move that could double the area’s population.
The Israeli actions have cast a spotlight on the military challenges facing Syria’s new rulers as they struggle to gain territorial control in the face of outside military interests. The United States has bombarded targets in Syria that it said are linked to Islamic State. There has also been an upsurge in fighting in northern Syria between the Syrian National Army, which is supported by Turkey, and U.S.-backed Kurdish forces.
Russia, long a major backer of Mr. al-Assad, has maintained military bases in Syria, but Dmitri S. Peskov, the Kremlin’s spokesman, said on Monday that there had been “no final decisions” on the future of those bases.
The post Netanyahu Visits Area Israel Recently Seized in Syria, Officials Say appeared first on New York Times.
