Israeli troops killed several armed terrorists in the security zone in southern Syria, the Israel Defense Forces said on Sunday.
The operation took place on Saturday, the military said, reiterating that Israeli forces will continue operating in the area to eliminate threats to Israeli civilians and IDF personnel.
Israeli forces have been positioned in the security zone since the fall of the Assad regime and the rise of Ahmed al-Sharaa, who, until recently, was a wanted Sunni Islamist terrorist.
Jerusalem has said that it forces will stay in the buffer zone indefinitely to combat threats from southern Syria and to protect the Druze community in Syria’s Suweida Governorate from tribal violence.
“We will not leave the security zones in Syria and Lebanon. This is our security doctrine. The IDF must be on the enemy’s side of the border and protect the communities from within the territory itself. Soldiers inside, residents outside. We are not withdrawing,” Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said on June 24.
The U.S. military is also operating against terrorist threats in Syria.
A senior Islamic State of Iraq and Syria leader was killed by U.S. forces in an airstrike in northwest Syria on June 19, U.S. Central Command announced on June 24.
Ali Husayn al-Ulaywi was killed in what CENTCOM described as a “precision strike,” part of ongoing efforts to “disrupt and eliminate terrorists seeking to attack Americans abroad or the U.S. homeland.”
