Syria’s killing fields are way too close for Israel's comfort

This will be remembered as the week the Syrian war finally came to Israel.

Smoke rises above buildings across the border from Israel following airstrikes by Syrian government forces.

This will be remembered as the week the Syrian war finally came to Israel. Sirens sounded in the country’s north for three days in a row, forcing Israelis into bomb shelters. The sirens were triggered by fighting inside Syria, right on ­Israel’s border. The war in which Israel has largely avoided taking an active role — with some exceptions such as airstrikes against Iranian targets and medical aid to wounded Syrian civilians — is now in the country’s back yard. ­

Israel captured the western part of the Golan Heights from Syria in 1967, effectively annexing it in 1981.

“Regime forces have been ­approaching areas close to our border. That, of course, has ­increased friction,” Israel ­Defence Forces spokesman Jonathan Conricus said. “We have been on elevated readiness levels on a variety of systems, both aerial and ground defence systems.”

On Monday, two Syrian SS-21 rockets failed to reach Israel and no casualties were reported. A day later it was more serious. Israel fired two Patriot missiles at a Syrian fighter jet that it says crossed into Israeli airspace. The missiles downed the Russian-made ­Suk­hoi jet. It fell in southern Syria, in the area still controlled by rebels including Islamic State. The pilot, Amran Mara’e, was ­reported as killed. Islamic State posted a video of the burnt wreckage online.

Israel’s military says it was tracking the jet from the moment it took off from the T-4 air base in central Syria and flew “at high speed” towards the border with ­Israel.

“Israel has a very clear policy: no plane, and certainly not a Syrian plane, is allowed to enter our airspace,” says Amos Yadlin, a former chief of Israeli military intelligence. “Any plane identified as an enemy plane is shot down.”

Syria denied the jet had strayed 2km into Israeli airspace.

Syria also condemned a military operation Israel carried out last Sunday, evacuating more than 400 “White Helmets”, a group of Syrian first responders known for rescuing civilians after airstrikes. The Syrians, along with their families, were taken across Israel to Jordan. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says Israel acted at the request of Western leaders, including US President Donald Trump and Canada’s Justin Trudeau. He says Israel took the step as an “exceptional ­humanitarian gesture”.

A Syrian official said the ­regime of President Bashar al-Assad would respond “soon enough” to the shooting down of its fighter jet. “Damascus is in no hurry to enter a war with Israel,” he told Lebanese news website El Nashra, and he was telling the truth. Fighting Israel would only be a burden now when Syria is so close to ending its civil war and is meeting so little resistance.

“The last thing President Assad wants is to give the Israeli Air Force the opportunity to ­destroy Syrian infrastructure,” says Kobi Marom, a retired col­onel who spent 25 years in the ­Israeli military, serving as a brigade commander on Israel’s northern border.

Now a research associate at the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism in Herzliya, he lives close to the border with Syria. “I hear the noise from the Syrian Russian bombing every day. As a military expert, I can see how there is spillover from that war, if they are launching missiles at the Islamic State group rebels, which is also the direction of ­Israel,” he says.

Southern Syria, close to the border with Israel and Jordan, ­appears to be the final battle ground in the bloody seven-year Syrian civil war, which has seen an estimated 500,000 Syrians killed and a further 11 million — half the country’s pre-war population — displaced.

During the past few months, 270,000 Syrians have been on the move in the country’s south ­attempting to escape government airstrikes. Neither Israel nor Jordan would let any of these people cross their borders. Still, according to Israeli intelligence, the last remaining rebel stronghold in southern Syria may be defended by as few as 1200 fighters, most from local ­Islamic State cells.

Marom stresses this does not necessarily mean the war will end quickly. “Airstrikes are not enough, you need soldiers on the ground, and the Syrian army’s capabilities have been seriously eroded. It could take weeks to clear out these last Islamic State rebels,” he says. “It’s not a piece of cake.”

However long it takes, it now seems clear that it will be Assad’s forces, supplied and backed by Russian and Iranian troops, who will be victorious. Negotiating the endgame involves all the countries operating inside Syria, first and foremost Russia as well as the US, Iran and Turkey — and on the border, Israel.

Israel is reportedly considering shutting down its “Good Neighbour” mission, which provided food and medical treatment to tens of thousands of Syrians across the border, as the aid recipients were from rebel-held villages. It’s also trying to restore the situation that existed before Assad’s forces withdrew from the border area four years ago. Israel is seeking to reinstate the 1974 Separation of Forces Agreement, insisting on a demilitarised zone between the two countries. Netanyahu described the Syrian plane entering Israeli airspace as a “gross violation of the 1974 Separation of Forces Agreement with Syria. I have reiterated and made clear that we will not accept any such violation. We insist that the Syrians strictly abide by the Separation of Forces Agreement ­between us and them.”

From an Israeli perspective, though, the main game in Syria is Russia. Israeli and Russian officials talk and meet frequently, at the highest levels. There is deep and sustained co-ordination ­between the two militaries. Russia is informed ahead of every Israeli airstrike on Iranian targets inside Syria. Israel will delay an attack or a reprisal if there’s any chance Russian troops could be involved.

On July 11, Netanyahu travelled to Moscow for talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Less than two weeks later, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei ­Lavrov and Military General Staff chief Valery Gerasimov “dropped in” for a surprise visit to Jerusalem — the day Israel downed the Syrian jet.

“For the first time in decades, Russia has both a warm water port and air fields in the Middle East. That is a huge strategic achievement and President Putin has ­relied on Iranian foot soldiers to achieve it,” says Guy Laron, senior lecturer in international relations at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. “Putin didn’t want Syria to turn into his Vietnam. He funded and equipped President Assad and provided strong aerial support, but he is still putting his ­forces in Syria on the cheap. Those paying the price in blood are Syrians and Iranians.”

It falls to Putin to balance the concerns of two countries with which Russia shares regional interests, Iran and Israel, who are enemies with each other.

“There are two major issues from the Israeli point of view,” says Marom. “In the Syrian military forces fighting along ­Israel’s border, in those brigades we see and we know there are Iranian and Hezbollah fighters. So Israel is also concerned about what happens on the day after Assad ­returns. What will characterise that border? Will it be quiet as it was for 40 years before the civil war? Or will it be unstable with a lot of escalations that Iranians and Hezbollah will cause?”

In talks about the status quo following the defeat of the rebels, Israel’s main focus is on keeping Iranian troops and other Shia ­militias out of southern Syria. In return, it is not taking any steps to oppose Assad’s return to the area.

Israeli media reports that Russia has proposed that it will guarantee there will be no Iranian troops near Syria’s border with ­Israel. “That means haggling about how far that buffer zone will extend. Will it be a distance of 50km or 60km, or more, since Putin can’t and doesn’t want to push Iran right out,” says Laron.

After the Israeli-Russian meeting in Jerusalem this week, Israeli officials say Lavrov offered to extend the buffer zone, keeping the Iranians 100km from the border. But Israel rejected this, arguing that even 100km was not a large enough buffer.

“We can’t ­accept that 100km zone because if we do it means Iran is going to be operating out of the T-4 air force base which is 200km to our north, and that they will be in Hamma and Aleppo,” Marom says. “The major threat is the long-range missiles that they will build and fire from there, missiles that can reach central Israel. Israel cannot accept it.”

But Marom is realistic about Russia’s ability to deliver on ­Israeli demands. “I don’t think Putin will tell the Iranians to leave; they have a strong relationship and a strong operation ­together. Israel is asking Putin for something he can’t give us.”

Instead, Marom looks to the newly reinstated US sanctions to weaken Iran’s resolve to remain in Syria. He cites a dramatic cut in Iranian funding to its Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah, as an indication that Tehran is already in financial difficulties, even before the sanctions come into full force next month. He argues an Iranian withdrawal is likelier to eventuate, rather than a war ­between Israel and Iran, because it’s in Russia’s interests.

“Moscow’s interest is to be the ‘last man standing’ in Syria. After Assad has defeated the rebels, he will ask all foreign nations to leave his country except Russia,” says Marom. That will cement Russia as a resurgent power in the Middle East as the US steps back from its role as the world’s policeman.

As leaders move their chess pieces on the board to further their strategic interests, the price paid by ordinary Syrians during the past seven years seems to be of ­little concern or relevance.

Irris Makler is a freelance writer based in Jerusalem.