Yossi Schwartz ISL (RCIT section in Israel/Occupied Palestine), 11.12.2024
The massive attacks on Syria and the destruction of modern weapons are a message to the people of Syria.”We can do whatever we want to you if you dare to oppose us. We are the masters“
The Zionist tanks crossed through the occupied Golan Heights and invaded deeper into Syrian territory, occupying a “buffer zone” created in 1974. The Zionist monster took over former Syrian army positions on the Jabal al-Sheikh, which Israel calls Mount Hermon. Also, it occupied the buffer zone in place since a 1974 armistice agreement that officially ended the war between Syria and Israel. In the town of Quneitra in the Golan Heights, reports emerged of Israeli troops invading the town and turning its justice department building into a military base. Video and photographs posted by Israeli soldiers show them posing inside local Syrian government offices and spraying abandoned homes with bullets, as well as Israeli tanks positioned in the streets. Israeli war Minister Israel Katz on Monday said the military would seize the entire buffer zone to protect Israeli settlements in the Golan Heights, which Israel has illegally occupied since 1967. By Tuesday, the Zionist army had penetrated farther into the country, occupying a large territory twice the size of the Gaza Strip.
The war criminal Netanyahu has said that the Golan is part of Israel and that the Israeli army occupied the “buffer zone” to protect the Golan Heights. However, the Zionist army has done even more destruction and eliminated Syrian military weapons-the deterrence system which tells the Syrians: “We do not care who governs Syria; Israel will ensure you do not possess the essential army capacity to defend yourself. You have a weak state, and it will remain so. What we’re doing now is making sure that you are defenseless. We’re exploiting this moment of chaos to completely disarm you and make sure that you’re completely defenseless in the future so that we can do whatever we like,’”
“Robin Yassin-Kassab, a British-Syrian analyst and co-author of the book Burning Country: Syrians in Revolution and War. Says, “There’s never been such crazy Israeli bombing in Syria. They’re arranging to disarm Syria completely, to make it completely defenseless, and to humiliate it. That’s the way that Syrians are understanding it as well. They are humiliating Syria.”.”[i]
The Biden administration has shown once again what is the nature of American imperialism. It has not called on Israel to halt its military operations nor condemned its occupation of more Syrian territory. “The Syrian army abandoned its positions in the area around the negotiated Israeli-Syrian buffer zone, which potentially creates a vacuum that terrorist organizations could have filled,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said at a briefing on Monday. “Israel has said that these actions are temporary to defend its borders. These are not permanent actions.” British foreign secretary David Lammy likewise defended Israel’s attacks in Syria, saying, “There are legitimate security concerns for Israel, particularly in the context of a country that has housed ISIS, Daesh, and Al-Qaeda.”[ii]
Since Assad’s fall, the Zionist monster has launched over 300 airstrikes across the country, hitting Syrian military installations, airports, weapons depots, radar and air defense systems, and aircraft squadrons in Damascus, Homs, Hama, Latakia, and elsewhere, in what the Zionist security source called “one of the largest attack operations in the history of its air force,” in comments to Israeli Army radio. The Israeli Navy also carried out a large-scale operation on Monday night to destroy the Syrian Navy fleet.
“Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Turkey have all condemned Israel’s advance, while UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric on Monday said the Israeli incursion constitutes a violation of the 1974 Disengagement Agreement.”
No doubt the U.S. and other Western imperialist support for Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza has empowered Netanyahu to attack and invade Syria.
HTS response:
“Ahmed al-Sharaa, the head of the powerful militant group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which led the overthrow of Assad, has said he belongs to forcibly displaced from their home in the Golan Heights in 1967. The nom-de-guerre he took, Abu Muhammad al-Jolani, refers to the region. He also said the second Palestinian intifada in the early 2000s was a pivotal event that shaped his politics. “I was 17 or 18 years old at the time, and I started thinking about how to fulfill my duties defending a people who occupiers and invaders oppress,” he said.”[iii] However, HTS has not commented on the latest Israeli attacks.
Jolani has suggested that HTS does not seek to rule Syria and would dissolve itself as part of rebuilding a central government. On Tuesday, Mohammed al-Bashir—who administered the HTS-led Salvation Government in northwest Syria—assumed the role of interim prime minister to coordinate the creation of a transitional government. The announcement was made after meetings that included Mohammed Ghazi al-Jalali, the last prime minister under Assad’s government.
The revolution was a significant historical event, but solving Syria’s problems, including expelling the imperialists and winning against Israel, is beyond the capacity of the HTS. For this, the revolution must proceed to republican rule by the working class, with the support of the poor peasants led by a revolutionary working class.
Complete the revolution by workers and peasant government!
Down with the Zionist monster!
For the Arab revolution!
For the socialist federation of the Middle East.
Endnotes:
[i] https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/FMfcgzQXKhDwtWQDXBfCXTgxZLwlpksz
[ii] Ibid
[iii] Ibid