Tag Archive for Syrian rebels

| June 9, 2013
No comments

UNSC: Israel said they would attack Syrian tanks on Golan Heights

Document submitted to UN Security Council says IDF told UN commander they would ‘take action’ if Syrian army tanks entered into agreed buffer zone during Quneitra battle with rebel.

By Ynet

 

The fierce battles in the Quneitra region between the Syrian army and rebels trying to overthrow President Bashar Assad threatened to result in a significant military confrontation between Israel and Syria, American blogger Nabil Abi Saab reported on Saturday.

פקחים, תצפיתנים ודריכות. אזור הקרבות בקונייטרה (צילום: AP)

UN vehicles near Quneitra battle zone – Photo: AP

The report was based on a document submitted to the Security Council by Herve Ladsous, UN Under Secretary General for Peacekeeping Operations. Continue Reading »

Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , , , ,
| June 8, 2013
No comments

Assad Aide: Israel’s Elite Units Aiding Rebels

Assad’s top aide claims IDF special unit involved in Quneitra battles.

 

In Hezbollah TV interview, she claims Israel working with rebels, which she called ‘armed gangs’.

By Roi Kais

In an interview to the Hezbollah affiliated Al Mayadeen network, Bouthaina Shaaban, the top political and media adviser to Syrian President Bashar Assad, claimed that the injured transferred to Israel during the fighting in Quneitra were Israeli soldiers and not rebels, which she called “armed gangs”.

Bouthaina Shaaban, the top political and media adviser to Syrian President Bashar Assad

Bouthaina Shaaban, the top political and media adviser to Syrian President Bashar Assad – Photo AP

“When we hear that wounded from the armed gangs were transferred to Israel for medical treatment, I wonder whether these might be Mista’arvim” – the Border Guard’s elite counter-terrorism unit, comprised of officers disguised as Arabs. Continue Reading »

Category: Jewish News | Tags: , , , ,
| June 7, 2013
No comments

Jerusalem to UN: Replace Austrian peacekeepers that withdrew from Golan Heights

Israel says it does regret Austria’s decision to pull its more than 300 troops out of the 1,100-strong UN force following clashes at Quneitra, but expects the UN to maintain its mandate on the Israel-Syria border.

 

Israel demanded on Thursday that the United Nations replace the Austrian soldiers that were pulled out of a UN peacekeeping force on the Golan Heights as soon as possible.

Quneitra Syria

Smoke rises from a fire as a result of fighting in the Syrian village of Quneitra near the border with Israel. – Photo: AP

Following the battles at Quneitra in Syria early on Thursday morning, Austria announced it was withdrawing its troops that serve in the UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) in the Golan.

Continue Reading »
Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , , , , ,
| May 20, 2013
No comments

Hezbollah takes serious losses in Syria with 30 killed on Sunday

At least 30 members of Shiite terrorist group fighting alongside Assad’s troops killed in battles in Qusair.

 

IDF outpost observes shooting directed at Israel from Syria.

Yoav Zitun, Maor Buchnik

 

An IDF observation post in the border area in the Golan Heights reported detecting small arms firing from the Syrian side of the border at an open area in Israel. No injuries or damage were reported.

מאבק עז של המורדים בקוסייר (צילום: AP)

Rebels in Qusair – Photo: AP

A complaint was lodged with the United Nations. The army is checking whether fire had indeed been directed at Israel.

Meanwhile, Syrian activists reported that about 30 Hezbollah fighters and 20 Syrian soldiers and militiamen loyal to President Bashar Assad were killed in heavy fighting with rebels on Sunday in the town of Qusair. Continue Reading »

Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , , ,
| May 13, 2013
No comments

Everyone Blames Israel: Rebel leader says Israel wants Assad kept in power

Rebel militia

commander

 claims alleged Israeli airstrikes in Damascus were aimed at preventing weapons from falling into rebel hands.

 

He went on to says Jerusalem is cooperating with Iran & Hezbollah to keep Assad in power.

By Ynet

 

 

The commander of a Syrian rebel militia is claiming that the alleged Israeli airstrikes in Damascus were meant to prevent rebels from seizing Assad’s weapons caches, Turkey’s Today Zaman reported Sunday.

 SA 17

Abdul Qader Saleh, commander of the Al-Tawhid Brigade, told the Turkish news agency Cihan that Bashar Assad‘s regime has in fact already been defeated and that Iran and Hezbollah , with Israel’s backing, are preventing his downfall. Continue Reading »

Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , ,
| May 10, 2013
No comments

Israeli finds aid to help Syrians ‘being butchered nearby’

Moti Kahana ‘can’t sit still as women & children are being butchered nearby’.

 

Syrian rebel: American airstrikes could

collapse Assad’s regime.

Yitzhak Benhorin

As many in Israel are concerned over the possibility that the civil war raging in Syria will spill over to the Golan Heights and strengthen the standing of Hezbollah, some Israelis regard the crisis in the neighboring country from another angle entirely.

כהנא. "לא חשבנו שהמלחמה תימשך כל כך הרבה זמן" (צילום: יצחק בן-חורין)

Moti Kahan – Photo: Yitzhak Benhorin

Jerusalem native Moti Kahana heads a group of Israeli businessmen and American Jews who travel to the Syrian refugee camps to provide humanitarian aid to victims of one of the era’s bloodiest conflicts. Continue Reading »

Category: Mid-East News | Tags: ,
| May 7, 2013
3 comments

Tweet from Syria: “unlikely sight: Syrian refugees cheer Israel,”

Syrian rebels have said they no longer hate Israel, saying the Jewish state had the ‘balls’ to do what other Arab states & the West won’t do.

By Israel Today Staff

 

Syrian refugees from that country’s ongoing civil war are reportedly cheering Israel’s weekend air strikes on bases belonging to embattled dictator Bashar Assad, saying that the Jewish state has the “balls” to do what the other Arabs and the West won’t.

Clarissa Ward, a correspondent for CBS News who has spent a lot of time of late in rebel-held parts of Syria, posted Sunday to her Twitter account about an “unlikely sight: Syrian refugees cheer Israel, or rather Israeli strikes near Damascus. Continue Reading »

Category: Israel News | Tags: ,
| April 29, 2013
No comments

Report from Syria: Israeli Jets bomb a Syrian chemical weapons factory

The Free Syrian Army reports that Israeli jets destroyed a Syrian chemical weapons plant before rebels groups could get their hands on the goods.

By  Israel Today Staff

 

The Free Syrian Army (FSA) reported at the weekend that Israeli warplanes had bombed a chemical weapons base in Damascus. The Israeli government gave no response.

Israel Air Force F-15 upgraded Eagles - Photo courtesy IDF's Spokesperson's Office

Israel Air Force F-15 upgraded Eagles – Photo courtesy: IDF’s Spokesperson’s Office

 

FSA forces and the Syrian army were reportedly battling close to another chemical weapons base on the outskirts of Damascus on Monday, with the outcome of the battle still very much undetermined.

Israel and the West have taken the Syrian regime to task for reportedly using chemical weapons against rebel populations in recent weeks. Continue Reading »

Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , , ,
| April 8, 2013
No comments

Israel Concerned After Syrian Troops Withdrawn from Golan

Damascus withdrew large numbers of gov’t troops from the Golan Heights & rebels have taken over, the Guardian reported.

By Elad Benari

 

 

The Syrian government has withdrawn large numbers of troops from the Golan Heights, in a move that has cast doubt over the future of a UN peacekeeping force on the strategically vital plateau, the British Guardian reported Sunday.

Western diplomats told the newspaper that the Syrian redeployments near the Golan ceasefire line were the most significant in 40 years, with at least several thousand soldiers thought to have been moved in recent weeks to battle fronts closer to Damascus. Continue Reading »

Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , , ,
| April 5, 2013
No comments

Syrian rebels trained by Hamas

London ‘Times’ reports the Hamas’ Kassam Brigades began training members of opposition in Damascus after braking ties with former ally Assad.

By JPOST.COM STAFF

 

 

The military unit of Hamas has broken ties with former ally Syrian President Bashar Assad and began training members of the opposition’s Free Syrian Army in Damascus, the Times of London reported on Friday.

Member of the Free Syrian Army

Member of the Free Syrian Army – Photo: REUTERS/Goran Tomasevic

Anonymous diplomatic sources told the Times that members of the Izzadin Kassam Brigades were training FSA units in the rebel-held neighborhoods of Yalda, Jaramana and Babbila in the Syrian capital.

“The Kassam Brigades have been training units very close to Damascus.

Continue Reading »
Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , ,
| March 26, 2013
No comments

Israel considers creating Syrian buffer zone with aid of local villages

 

Maj. Gen. Yair Golan said, “One of the defensive measures that we of course cannot rule out is creating a defensive buffer zone on the other side of the border, together with interlocutors who will have an interest in cooperating with us against other elements who threaten them too,”

By Yoav Limor

OC Northern Command Maj. Gen Yair Golan, the man who is staring down the barrel of a disintegrating Syria, so to speak, has assessments that point to the possibility that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s army has already used small amounts of chemical weapons against rebel forces.

 

Maj.

Continue Reading »
Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , , ,
| March 24, 2013
No comments

Syria’s Jihadist Rebels Seize the Jordan-Israeli DMZ Buffer Zone

Jihadist rebel militias in Syria have seized a 25-km (15 mile) demilitarized buffer zone from the Jordanian border to the Golan Heights.

By Chana Ya’ar

 

Syrian rebel forces have seized a 25-kilometer (15 mile) buffer zone stretching from the Jordanian border to the Golan Heights.

Syrian rebelsAccording to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights watchdog agency, “Fighters loyal to Al Nusra Front, Al Yarmuk Brigade, Al Mutaz Billah Brigade and others took control of Al Rai military checkpoint” east of Sahem al-Golan, in the Dara’a province.

“The fighters seized the site after regime forces retreated,” the statement continued. “The 25-kilometer area located between the towns of Muzrib (near the Jordanian border) and Abdin (in the Golan Heights) is now out of regime control,” AFP reported. Continue Reading »

Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , ,
| March 12, 2013
No comments

Syrian rebels receive weapons from the West with Israel next target

Western countries have begun training & even arming the Syrian rebel groups in spite of warnings from Israel that these groups are radical Islamists that are likely to turn those newly acquired weapons on Israel.

By Ryan Jones

 

Israeli army chief Gen. Benny Gantz on Monday warned that the Syrian rebel groups that America and Europe are now helping to arm and train might turn their hostility toward Israel after ousting the regime of dictator Bashar Assad.

UNDOF soldiers watching for rebel fighters who've infiltrated the Golan Heights DMZ - Photo Israel Today

UNDOF soldiers watching for rebel fighters who’ve infiltrated the Golan Heights DMZ – Photo: Israel Today

“The situation in Syria has become unstable and incredibly dangerous,” Gantz said at the 2013 Herzliya Conference. Continue Reading »

Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , ,
| March 10, 2013
No comments

IDF on High Alert on its Border with Syria

Israel’s forces are on high alert in the Golan Heights as Rebel forces enter DMZ & begin to take pot-shots into Israel.

By Chana Ya’ar

 

IDF forces are on high alert in the Golan Heights, carefully scrutinizing the border with Syria, as opposition forces begin to consider a new target: Israel.

Syrian rebels have penetrated the demilitarized zone (DMZ) separating Syria from Israel. The status of the area respected by both Israel and Syria since the end of the Yom Kippur War, though both are technically still at war, is apparently respected no longer.

In a video posted Saturday on the Internet by Syrian opposition forces, the rebels are seen in the Syrian side of the Golan Heights DMZ, firing guns right next to a U.N. Continue Reading »

Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , , , , , ,
| March 9, 2013
No comments

Syrian rebels shoot weapons in Golan DMZ

Exploiting the UN peacekeepers’ absence, Assad’s opponents release videos shot not in demilitarized zone on border with Israel where they vow to ‘return the Golan to the free Syrian people’

By Roi Kais

 

Syrian rebels, active in the Syrian Golan Heights, are approaching the Israeli border: While 21 United Nation peacekeepers were released by the rebels after being held for four days, Syrian President Bashar Assad ‘s opponents on Saturday evening posted videos showing them firing in the air not far from the border with Israel.

Rebels within demilitarized zoneIn one of the videos, the rebels are seen traveling in a vehicle within a demilitarized area. Continue Reading »

Category: Mid-East News | Tags: , ,
« Older Entries   Recent Entries »