Syria latest: Israel denies sending troops beyond Golan Heights buffer zone. Video Icon. VIDEO. Updated 13 minutes ago. Rebel leader vows to publish list of ‘war criminals’ involved in torture under the deposed leader Bashar al-Assad’s regime as rescue workers end their search at Sednaya prison. Israeli airstrikes destroyed a Syrian naval ship in the port city of LatakiaAAREF WATAD/GETTY IMAGES. |. |. , Israel Correspondent |. | Edmund Bower, Damascus. Tuesday December 10 2024, 1.32pm, The Times. Key moments. The Israeli military’s incursion into Syria was reported to have reached about 25km south of Damascus — Israel denies that its forces have advanced beyond the buffer zone in the occupied Golan Heights and into Syria. Syria’s rebel leader, Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, vows to publish a list of “war criminals” involved in the widespread torture of Syrians under the regime of Bashar al-Assad and hold them accountable. Rescue workers at the notorious Sednaya prison say they have ended their search for further detainees at the site close to the capital without finding any more prisoners. Listen to updates on Times Radio. Downing Street said that it is “not possible to assess” Syrian asylum applications after the rebel takeover of Damascus and confirmed that all decisions would be halted until further notice.. “The vast majority of Syrians have fled the Assad regime,” the prime minister’s spokesman said. “It’s right that we pause these applications as events unfold.” The spokesman also confirmed that the designation of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the group responsible for toppling Assad, as a terrorist group was “under review”.. About 6,500 Syrians are awaiting a decision on their asylum claims from the UK government. David Lammy, the foreign secretary, has warned that further turmoil in Syria could lead to a fresh influx of migrants to Britain.. Pictures have emerged of Syrian ships after they were destroyed in overnight Israeli airstrikes in the port city of Latakia. A nearby air defence installation was also targeted, according to Reuters.. AAREF WATAD/GETTY IMAGES. Latakia is one of Syria’s main Mediterranean ports, about 145km southwest of Aleppo. The IDF said that airstrikes on Syrian military facilities were intended to keep weapons abandoned by Assad’s army from being taken by hostile forces.. Advertisement. More than 200 airstrikes were carried out overnight by the IDF, destroying a large share of remaining army assets, according to Israeli media.. Spain will keep processing asylum requests from Syrian nationals as usual, José Manuel Albares, the foreign minister, said today.. Some European countries, including Britain, Germany and France, have suspended the processing of applications by Syrians since the collapse of the Assad regime, but Albares said there was no need to change the approach for now since the number of applications received by Spain was smaller, comparatively.. “At this moment that [suspension] is not necessary and is not being discussed,” he told a news briefing.. In the first 11 months of the year, 1,393 Syrians sought asylum in Spain, according to data from the country’s interior ministry.. Advertisement. Syrian government employees were told to go back to work today.. Shops had remained closed since the the rebel opposition toppled the Assad regime on Sunday. Today the first shops and ministries opened. The streets remain littered with abandoned military vehicles and bullet casings from days of celebratory gunfire.. Syrians gathered yesterday in Damascus to celebrate the end of the Assad regime. EMIN SANSAR/GETTY IMAGES. One engineer at the Syrian Television Centre said it felt weird to be going back to work but that “things are starting to go back to normal. God willing, this will be a new Syria”.. A spokesman for the Israeli military has said its troops are operating in the Golan Heights buffer zone “and a few additional points” but was not intervening in Syria.. “There are a few additional points on the Israeli side, on the Syrian side, which we operated in,” the spokesman said. “Just to make sure that the stability is kept”.. Advertisement. The spokesman added: “We are not involved in what’s happening in Syria internally. We are not a side in this conflict, and we do not have any interest other than protecting our borders and the security of our civilians. We have no side in this … we are not looking for a war with the people that are living there.”. Israel was also determined to “prevent lethal strategic weapons from reaching the wrong hands”, the spokesman added.. Israel strikes Syria as troops move into buffer zone. Mohammed al-Bashir has said in a televised statement that he has been appointed as the caretaker prime minister of Syria’s transitional government until March 1 next year.. He ran the rebel-led Syrian Salvation Government before the 12-day lightning offensive swept into Damascus. Bashir trained as an engineer and has previously worked at a gas plant.. Mohammed al-Bashir. OMAR HAJ KADOUR/GETTY IMAGES. Vladimir Putin and Bashar al-Assad. Syria was Russia’s biggest ally in the Middle East. AFP. Russian state media quickly sought to downplay the implications of Assad’s fall in Damascus, despite the collapse marking a major blow to Moscow.. Advertisement. This contrasts with the narrative presented when President Putin launched Russia’s 2015 military intervention in Syria, which was framed as a testament to the country’s resurgence as a global power capable of challenging Western influence.. • Read in full: Why Assad’s fall exposes Russia’s weakness. Qatari officials are in contact with the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which led the overthrow of Assad, an official told Agence France-Presse today.. “The Qataris have established the first channel of communication with HTS. Communication with HTS and Qatari diplomats are expected to continue in the next 24 hours with al-Bashir,” the official said on condition of anonymity, referring to Mohammed al-Bashir, the senior rebel and Syria’s new prime minister.. A Jordanian man has returned to his home country after spending 38 years in Syrian jails, an official said today, after the fall of Assad ended an agonising wait for his family.. Advertisement. The man, named as Osama Bashir Hassan al-Bataynah, was found in Syria “unconscious and suffering from memory loss”, Soufian al-Kodat, the Jordanian foreign ministry spokesman, told Agence France-Presse. Kodat said the man’s relatives reported his disappearance in 1986, when he was 18 years old, and that he had been in jail ever since.. “He was transferred from Damascus to the Jaber border crossing [with Jordan] where he was handed over to border guards,” Kodat added, saying that the man had been reunited with his family this morning.. People gathered at Sednaya prison in Damascus to look for loved ones yesterday. OMAR HAJ KADOUR/GETTY IMAGES. Tehran has announced it has brought home 4,000 Iranian citizens from Syria following the collapse of Assad’s government.. “Over the past three days, 4,000 Iranian citizens were returned to Iran,” Fatemeh Mohajerani, a spokeswoman for Iran’s government, said at a press conference in the capital.. Israeli soldiers near the so-called Alpha Line that separates the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights from Syria, in the town of Majdal Shams. MATIAS DELACROIX/AP. Turkey has accused Israel of an “occupying mentality” after its forces entered a UN-patrolled buffer zone in the Golan Heights.. “We strongly condemn Israel’s entry into the separation zone between Israel and Syria,” a foreign ministry statement said, adding: “In this sensitive period … Israel is once again displaying its occupying mentality.”. Turkey has been criticised for its attempts to weaken the Kurdish military stationed in an autonomous territory in northern Syria across the Turkish border.. A Syrian naval ship was destroyed in an overnight Israeli attack on the port city of Latakia. AAREF WATAD/GETTY IMAGES. Syria’s Barzah scientific research centre, near Damascus, was hit by an Israeli airstrike. LOUAI BESHARA/GETTY IMAGES. Israeli airstrikes caused damage and led to a truck to burn near Qamishli International Airport, according to regional security sources. ORHAN QEREMAN/REUTERS. ORHAN QEREMAN/REUTERS. The UN special envoy for Syria has called on Israel to halt its military movements and bombardments inside Syria.. “We are continuing to see Israeli movements and bombardments into Syrian territory. This needs to stop. This is extremely important,” Geir Pedersen told reporters in Geneva.. The destruction at the Barzah scientific research centre, near Damascus. LOUAI BESHARA/GETTY IMAGES. Austria will support Syrians who want to return home after the downfall of the Assad regime, Karl Nehammer, the chancellor, said today.. “The fall of the Assad regime is changing the overall situation in Syria. The country now needs its citizens,” Nehammer posted on X. “We will support everyone, who wants to return to their homeland.”. Yesterday the Austrian government said it had paused the processing of asylum applications by Syrians, one of several European countries to do so.. Shamima Begum left the UK for Syria when she was 15 and has been stripped of her UK nationality. The fall of Assad has raised concerns over the fate of British jihadists held in camps and prisons in Syria, creating uncertainty about the UK’s security.. About 70 British nationals remain detained in Kurdish-controlled areas in northeastern Syria after the collapse of Islamic State’s self-declared caliphate in 2019.. While many political prisoners have been freed following Assad’s downfall, no British Isis fighters are thought to be among them.. • Read in full: What does the fall of Damascus mean for British jihadists in Syrian prisons?. Syrians gathered yesterday in Damascus after the end of 61 years of Baath Party rule. EMIN SANSAR/GETTY IMAGES. HASAN BELAL/GETTY IMAGES. Any potential return of British jihadists to the UK is “a matter of great concern”, a Home Office minister has said, amid worries about the fallout of the collapse of the Assad regime.. Dame Angela Eagle told Times Radio that intelligence services are “keeping a very, very close eye” on the situation on the ground, and that the UK is in touch with allies.. Asked about the prospect of jihadists who are British citizens returning to the UK, Eagle said: “Rest assured that the intelligence services are keeping a very close eye on what’s going on and we’re in contact with all of our allies to see how this pans out.”. An Israeli military spokesman has denied that its forces had advanced beyond the buffer zone in the occupied Golan Heights and into Syrian territory, despite Syrian sources reporting that the incursion had reached up to 25km from Damascus, the capital.. “It’s not true, the forces have not left the buffer zone,” the spokesman said.. Regional security sources said that Israeli airstrikes continued against military installations across the country. ORHAN QEREMAN/REUTERS. A monitor of Syria’s war has claimed it has recorded more than 300 Israeli strikes since rebels toppled Assad over the weekend.. “The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights has been able to document around 310 strikes” carried out by “Israeli warplanes” since the announcement of the fall of Assad on Sunday morning, the monitor said.. The commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards has claimed Tehran has not been weakened after the fall of its ally Assad in Syria, Iranian media reported.. “We have not been weakened and Iran’s power has not diminished,” Hossein Salami was quoted as telling members of parliament in a closed session. Iran and Russia had propped up Assad’s rule since Syria’s civil war erupted in 2011 and Tehran deployed its Revolutionary Guards to the country.. “The overthrow of the Zionist regime [Israel] is not off the agenda,” Salami said in the session which met to discuss the latest developments in Syria. Salami said no Iranian forces remained in Syria.. Saudi Arabia has condemned Israel’s incursion into a buffer zone in Syria following the overthrow of Assad.. The Saudi foreign ministry said in a statement today that “the assaults carried out by the Israeli occupation government, including the seizure of the buffer zone in the Golan Heights, and the targeting of Syrian territory confirm Israel’s continued violation of the principles of international law and its determination to sabotage Syria’s chances of restoring its security, stability and territorial integrity”.. Rescuers search for secret compartments in Sednaya prison. ANAGHA SUBHASH NAIR/GETTY IMAGES. The White Helmets, The Syrian civil defence group, has called a halt to its search operations at Sednaya prison. The group was investigating reports from survivors that people were still being held in a network of underground cells.. The White Helmets said there was “no evidence of undiscovered secret cells or basements”. The group said the operation involved five teams, including two K9 (trained police dog) units.. “The teams inspected all entrances, exits, ventilation shafts, sewage systems, water pipes, electrical wiring, and surveillance camera cables. Despite these extensive efforts, no hidden or sealed areas were identified.”. More than 30,000 detainees were believed to have been executed or died due to torture, lack of medical care, or starvation at the notorious prison, nicknamed the “human slaughterhouse”, between 2011 and 2018.. Israel’s military says it is taking “proactive” steps to defend its border with Syria.. Israeli troops have been deployed inside a buffer zone, an area previously demilitarised under a 50-year-old ceasefire agreement, and have also taken over abandoned Syrian army posts beyond the zone.. IDF troops near the buffer zone in the Golan Heights. REX. In a statement released yesterday, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said that troops “took steps to proactively ensure the defence of the Golan Heights in light of internal events in Syria”, adding that the military was “conducting defence activities in the field to prevent any threat”.. Israel says the move to seize the zone and the area beyond it, including the Syrian side of Mount Hermon, was triggered by a security incident over the weekend which led to armed gunmen breaching a UN peacekeeping base.. Israel’s defence minister said the country will establish a “security zone” beyond the buffer area in order to prevent Iran from smuggling weapons through Syria into Lebanon.. Syria’s rebel leader has vowed to pursue former senior government officials responsible for torture and war crimes.. “We will not hesitate to hold accountable the criminals, murderers, security and army officers involved in torturing the Syrian people,” Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, the rebel leader, said today in a statement on Telegram.. “We will offer rewards to anyone who provides information about senior army and security officers involved in war crimes,” Jolani added.. The de facto leader of more than 23 million Syrians said the incoming authorities would also seek the return of officials who have fled abroad.. Jolani held talks yesterday with Mohammed Ghazi al-Jalali, the outgoing prime minister, “to co-ordinate a transfer of power that guarantees the provision of services” to Syria’s people, according to an earlier statement on Telegram.. An Israeli military incursion into southern Syria has reached about 25km southwest of Damascus, the capital, two regional security sources and one Syrian security source have told Reuters.. Smoke rises after airstrikes in Damascus on Tuesday morning. OMAR HAJ KADOUR/GETTY IMAGES. The Syrian security source said Israeli troops had reached Qatana, which is 10km into Syrian territory, east of a demilitarised zone separating the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights from Syria. The Israeli military declined to comment.. Israel captured the Golan Heights in 1967 and later annexed it. The entire international community, except for the United States, considers the plateau to be occupied Syrian territory.. Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, announced on Sunday that the 50-year-old ceasefire agreement with Syria had collapsed. He said Syrian troops had abandoned their positions, necessitating the Israeli takeover as a “temporary defensive position”.. Video Icon. DISPATCH. Inside Sednaya prison, Assad’s ‘human slaughterhouse’. December 10 2024, 12.55am. Edmund Bower, Damascus. From a palace to a dacha: the Assads in Moscow. December 10 2024, 12.01am. Simon Sebag Montefiore. PROMOTED CONTENT. Next article. Why is Israel attacking Syria?. Next article
