Israeli troops deployed to the buffer zone with Syria continue to destroy weapons belonging to the former Assad regime that “pose a danger to the security of the State of Israel and our forces,” the army said on Monday.
Soldiers from the 474th Golan Regional Brigade of the Israel Defense Forces 210th “Bashan” Division carried out “dozens of targeted raids in which they located, confiscated and destroyed a variety of weapons,” the IDF said.
“We are conducting operations day and night,” 474th Brigade battalion commander Lt. Col. H. said in remarks published by the military. “In an activity we conducted tonight, we found weapons inside one of the houses, and this is connected to a series of operations in which we also found missiles, explosives and mines, as well as explosive devices, tanks and armored personnel carriers, which we also blew up and destroyed.
“All of this in order to protect the residents of the southern Golan Heights and the citizens of the State of Israel,” said the commander.
In another raid last week, paratroopers operating under the brigade’s command located rifles, ammunition and other equipment left behind by the former Syrian Armed Forces, according to the IDF statement.
On Jan. 15, the IDF revealed that its troops had confiscated more than 3,000 weapons and other equipment belonging to Bashar Assad’s military.
Since the fall of the Iranian- and Russian-backed Assad regime, Israeli forces have taken up positions inside and beyond the Golan buffer zone, including on the strategic Syrian side of Mount Hermon. The Israeli Air Force has conducted hundreds of strikes on former Assad military assets to prevent them from falling into the hands of hostile forces.
Ahmed al-Sharaa, head of Syria’s Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group and the nation’s de facto leader, has asked the U.S. to pressure Israel to withdraw from the Golan buffer zone and the summit of Mount Hermon.
