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28-02-2026
JERUSALEM/ DAMASCUS: Dozens of Israeli military vehicles have staged an incursion into Syria’s southwestern Quneitra province in the occupied Golan Heights, local media reported, in yet another breach of the country’s sovereignty.
Al-Ikhbariah TV said on Wednesday that a convoy of 30 vehicles entered the eastern Tel al-Ahmar area near the village of Ain Ziwan in Quneitra, where the Israeli army conducted a search operation.
Separately on Wednesday, the state-owned Sana news agency reported that Israeli forces reached near Bariqa village, also in Quneitra, and abducted a young Syrian man while he was tending his sheep. In another incident, the report added, three Israeli military vehicles temporarily penetrated the Abu Madharah farm.
Syria’s southern regions including Quneitra, have long witnessed Israeli territorial violations, sowing fear, detaining civilians, erecting checkpoints and gates and destroying farmland but since the toppling of longtime leader Bashar al-Assad in December 2024, those have become more brazen, violent and frequent. Israel has launched multiple bombing raids on the country and also intervened last summer in an eruption of violence in Syria’s restive Suwayda.
According to a tally by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED), Israel launched an average of almost two attacks a day for a total of more than 600 air, drone or artillery attacks across Syria throughout 2025.
The Syrian government and Druze factions carried out their first prisoner swap in Suwayda on Thursday since those deadly clashes in July, the government’s media office in the city said.
The exchange involved Damascus releasing 61 prisoners from the Druze factions detained in Adra Central Prison near the capital, in return for the Druze’s National Guard forces freeing 25 Syrian government personnel, the media office said. The operation took place under the supervision of the International Committee of the Red Cross. Violence erupted in Suwayda on July 13 between Bedouin tribal fighters and Druze factions. Government forces were sent in to quell the fighting, but the bloodshed worsened, and Israel carried out strikes on Syrian troops and also bombed the heart of the capital, Damascus, under the pretext of protecting the Druze.
Quneitra is located in the Golan Heights, which the UN recognizes as part of Syria. Israel seized 1,200sq km (463sq miles) of the western part of that region in the Six-Day War in 1967. During the 1973 Arab-Israeli War, Syria attempted to take back the Golan Heights but failed.
The conflict ended with a disengagement agreement in 1974 that saw the establishment of a UN buffer zone, which separates Israeli-occupied territory from the remaining part that is still under Syria’s control. Part of the Quneitra province lies inside the buffer zone. Once the al-Assad regime fell, Israel pushed deeper into Syrian territory, occupying the buffer zone and saying the 1974 deal with Syria had collapsed. It also advanced into the Quneitra area, setting up two military checkpoints last year in the villages of Ain Ziwan and al-Ajraf. The government in Damascus has repeatedly affirmed its commitment to the agreement, saying that continued Israeli violations hinder efforts to restore stability in the region.
Syria and Israel have been conducting intermittent talks to reach a security agreement. That culminated in early January with the two countries agreeing to set up a joint mechanism for sharing intelligence and coordinating military de-escalation under US supervision.
Still, Syrian officials maintain that any durable deal will be difficult until Israel produces a clear and enforceable timeline for the pullout of its troops from Syrian territory. (Int’l News Desk)
