Israeli warplanes carried out airstrikes on targets inside Syria on Sunday using one-ton bombs and bunker-busting munitions, according to converging media reports.
Israel’s Army Radio stated that the military is focused on destroying “every potential military target” linked to the ousted regime of Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad, including tanks, warplanes, intelligence facilities, and advanced military equipment.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced on Sunday the collapse of a UN-monitored disengagement agreement, which had created a buffer zone between Israel and Syria after Syrian regime forces withdrew following the fall of Assad’s government.
The Israeli army confirmed that its forces advanced several kilometers into the demilitarized buffer zone in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights but insisted that they have no plans to push further, according to the same source.
In a statement issued early on Monday, the Israeli army said that paratroopers, along with additional forces, were deployed in strategic positions within the buffer zone, conducting “defense activities to prevent any threat.”
Israeli media reports indicated that the airstrikes focused on military bases, air defense stations, intelligence headquarters, as well as missile depots, weapons production facilities, and stockpiles of unconventional weapons.
Al-Assad was granted asylum in Russia after anti-regime forces seized control of the capital, Damascus, early on Sunday, marking the fall of the Baath Party regime, which ruled Syria since 1963.