Israeli army air strikes on Gaza kill at least 76 Palestinians
In one of the attacks, at least 15 people were killed in an Israeli army strike on a popular market in Gaza city's Al Daraj neighbourhood, official news agency Wafa reported.
A surgeon at Al Ahli Arab Baptist Hospital, Dr Ahmed Qandil, was among the dead, medical sources said. Gaza's civil defence said more than 50 people were injured in the attack.
A separate strike killed at least 10 people at a water distribution point in central Gaza, officials said. Al Awda Hospital said it received 10 bodies, including six children, as well as 16 injured people after Israeli warplanes struck the water distribution point north-west of Nuseirat camp. Seven children were among those injured.
The Israeli army said it had intended to hit an Islamic Jihad militant in the area but a malfunction had caused the missile to fall "dozens of metres from the target".
"The IDF regrets any harm to uninvolved civilians," it said, adding that the incident was under review.
The Palestinian Foreign Ministry has condemned the strike on the water distribution point and other attacks on hungry Palestinians seeking to get food from the aid distribution centres run by the US-baked Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
Dozens others were killed in separate attacks on Gaza, Wafa said.
A drone strike killed at least five people in the Al Mawasi area of Khan Younis in southern Gaza. Three were killed in a separate strike on tents housing displaced people near Al Fayrouz area in north-western Gaza city. Two were killed when Israeli warplanes struck a group of people in the Al Tuffah neighbourhood of Gaza city.
Gaza's Health Ministry said on Sunday that at least 58,026 Palestinians, most of them civilians, have been killed in the 21-month war that was caused by the Hamas -led attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023 that killed about 1,200 people and saw the abduction of 251.
Out of 251 people taken hostage that day, 49 are still held in Gaza, including 27 that the Israeli army says are dead.
The war has displaced almost the entire population of more than 2.3 million people, caused a humanitarian crisis and left much of the territory in ruins.
Seven UN agencies warned that a fuel shortage had reached 'critical levels', threatening aid operations, hospital care and already chronic food insecurity.
The Israeli army on Saturday warned Gaza residents against entering the sea area along the enclave, saying security restrictions have been imposed.
'We urge fishermen, swimmers, and divers to refrain from entering the sea. Entering the sea along the strip puts you at risk,' spokesman Avichay Adraee said in a post on X.
Talks to agree a 60-day ceasefire in the fighting and hostage release were in the balance on Sunday after Israel and Hamas accused each other of trying to block a deal.
Hamas wants the complete withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, but a Palestinian source said Israel had presented plans to maintain troops in more than 40 per cent of the territory.
The source said Israel wanted to force hundreds of thousands of Palestinians into the south of Gaza 'in preparation for forcibly displacing them to Egypt or other countries'.
A senior Israeli official said Israel had demonstrated 'a willingness to flexibility in the negotiations, while Hamas remains intransigent, clinging to positions that prevent the mediators from advancing an agreement'.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he is prepared to enter talks for a more lasting end to hostilities once a temporary truce is agreed, but only if Hamas disarms.
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Middle East Eye
an hour ago
- Middle East Eye
How the BBC obscures UK complicity in Gaza genocide
After months of a confected furore over a BBC documentary supposedly demonstrating pro-Hamas bias, followed by the shelving of a second film on Gaza, an independent review recently found that the broadcaster did not breach impartiality guidelines. A long list of complaints against Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone - pushed for months by pro-Israel lobbying groups, and amplified by the British establishment media - were dismissed one after another by Peter Johnston, director of the editorial complaints and review body that reports to the BBC director general. Not that you would know any of this from the eagerness of BBC executives to continue apologising profusely for the failings the corporation had just been cleared of. It almost sounded as if they wanted to be found guilty. The row is now set to drag on for many months more after Ofcom, the UK's communications regulator, announced it too would investigate the programme. All of this is exactly what pro-Israel lobbying groups and the billionaire-owned media had hoped for. The aim of manufacturing this protracted storm in a teacup was twofold. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters Firstly, the furore was designed to distract from what the documentary actually showed: the horrors facing children in Gaza as they have had to navigate a tiny strip of land where Israel has trapped them, bombed their homes, levelled their schools and hospitals, exposed them to relentless carnage for 21 months, and starved their loved ones. Secondly, it aimed to browbeat the BBC into adopting an even more craven posture towards Israel than it had already. If it was reluctant before to give Palestinians a voice, it will now avoid doing so at all costs. True to form, executives hurriedly removed How to Survive a Warzone from its iPlayer catch-up service the moment the lobby went into action. Dangerous consequences The BBC's ever-greater spinelessness has dangerous real-world consequences. Israel will feel even freer to intensify what the International Court of Justice already suspected back in January 2024 was a genocide, and what leading genocide and Holocaust scholars have subsequently concluded is a genocide. There will be even less pressure on the British government to stop partnering with Israel in its genocide by supplying weapons, intelligence and diplomatic cover. This is about Israel - and the Starmer government - dictating to the BBC the terms of what can be said about Israel's treatment of Palestinians The enduring row will also hand a bigger stick to Rupert Murdoch and other media moguls with which to beat the BBC, making it cower even further. Signs of the BBC's defensiveness were already all too evident. While it was waiting for the Johnston report, the corporation ditched a separate documentary, Gaza: Doctors Under Attack, on Israel's systematic destruction of Gaza's hospitals and killing of some 1,600 health workers. It has since been shown by Channel 4. The BBC argued that - even though this second programme had passed its editorial checks - airing it risked contributing to a 'perception of partiality'. What that bit of BBC gobbledygook actually meant was that the problem was not 'partiality'. It was the perception of it by vested interests - Israel, its apologists, the Starmer government and British corporate media - who demand skewed BBC coverage of Gaza, so that Israel can carry on with a genocide in which the British establishment is utterly complicit. In other words, truth and accuracy be damned. This is about Israel - and the Starmer government - dictating to the BBC the terms of what can be said about Israel's treatment of Palestinians. Caving to pressure This brings us back to the Johnston report. The only significant finding against the BBC was on a single issue in its documentary on Gaza's children, How to Survive a Warzone. The film had not disclosed that its 13-year-old narrator was the son of an official in Gaza's Hamas-run government. Even in the current febrile atmosphere, Johnston found no grounds to uphold the manifold accusations of a breach by the BBC of impartiality rules. Nothing in the film, he concluded, was unfair to Israel. Instead, he stated that it was a breach of 'full transparency' not to have divulged the child narrator's tenuous connection to Hamas through his father's governmental work. Follow Middle East Eye's live coverage of the Israel-Palestine war Paradoxically, the BBC's coverage of Johnston's findings has been far more inaccurate about the child narrator than the original documentary. But there has been no uproar, because this particular inaccuracy from the BBC squarely benefits Israel. The News at Ten, reporting on the Johnston findings, asserted that the film's narrator was 'the son of an official in the militant group Hamas'. He is nothing of the sort. He is the son of a scientist who directed agricultural policy in Gaza's government, which is run by Hamas. The graver Israel's atrocities in Gaza, the quieter the BBC grows Read More » There is zero evidence that Ayman Alyazouri was ever a member of the militant wing of Hamas. He doesn't even appear to have been a member of its political wing. In fact, since 2018, Israel had set up a system to vet most officials in Gaza, like Alyazouri, to ensure they did not have such links before they were able to receive salaries funded by Qatar. Johnston himself concedes as much, noting that the programme makers failed to inform the BBC of the 13-year-old's background because their checks showed Alyazouri was a civilian technocrat in the government, not involved in its military or political arms. The team's only failing was an astounding ignorance of how pro-Israel lobbying groups operate, and how ready the BBC is to cave to its pressure tactics. In reality, Johnston's finding against the BBC was over little more than an editorial technicality, one intentionally blown up into a major scandal. Johnston himself gave the game away when he noted in his executive summary the need for 'full transparency' when the BBC makes programmes 'in such a contested setting'. In other words, special, much stricter editorial rules apply when the corporation intends to make programmes likely to upset Israel. From now on, that will likely mean that, in practice, such programmes are not made at all. Obvious double standard The double standard is glaring. The BBC made a documentary last year offering eyewitness testimony from Israeli survivors of the 7 October 2023 Hamas attack at the Nova music festival, where hundreds of Israelis were killed. Did the BBC insist that the backgrounds of the Israelis interviewed were checked and disclosed to the audience as part of the broadcast? Were viewers told whether festival-goers had served in the Israeli military, which for decades has been enforcing an illegal occupation and a system of apartheid over Palestinians, according to a ruling last year by the world's highest court? And what would it have indicated to audiences had the BBC included such contextual information about its Israeli eyewitnesses? That their testimonies had less validity, or that they could not be trusted? If it was not necessary to include such background details for Israeli eyewitnesses, why is it so important to do this for a 13-year-old Palestinian? And even more to the point, if the BBC needs to give details of 13-year-old Abdullah Alyazouri's background before he can be allowed to read a script written by the programme makers, why is the BBC not also required to give important background about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he appears in reports - such as the fact that he is wanted for arrest by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes against humanity? Exactly how trustworthy a narrator of events in the devastated enclave does the BBC consider Netanyahu to be, that it does not think this context needs including? Both-sidesing genocide The gains from this manufactured row for pro-Israel lobbyists - and for a Starmer government desperate to silence criticism of its complicity in genocide - were recently set out in stark detail by the makers of the second documentary on Israel's destruction of Gaza's health sector. In an article in the Observer newspaper, they recounted a series of startling admissions and demands from BBC executives made in script meetings. The corporation insisted that Doctors Under Attack could not be aired so long as the award-winning investigative reporter leading the programme, Ramita Navai, was given top billing. They demanded that she be downgraded to a mere 'contributor' - her role effectively disappeared - because she had supposedly made 'one-sided' social media posts criticising Israel for breaking international law. She was considered unacceptable, according to the BBC, because she had not been 'supportive enough of the other side': that is, Israel and its military carrying out systematic war crimes by destroying Gaza's hospitals, as documented in great detail in her film. Offering apologias for genocide - as the BBC has been doing for the past 21 months - is apparently a requirement before the corporation is willing to give journalists a platform to criticise Israel In a statement to Middle East Eye on its decision to shelve the documentary, the BBC said after Navai appeared on its Today radio programme and 'called Israel a 'rogue state that's committing war crimes and ethnic cleansing and mass murdering Palestinians'', it was impossible for the BBC to broadcast the material without risking its own impartiality: 'The BBC holds itself to the highest standards of impartiality and it would never be acceptable for any BBC journalist to express a personal opinion in this way.' Seen another way, offering apologias for genocide - as the BBC has been doing for the past 21 months - is apparently a requirement before the corporation is willing to give journalists a platform to criticise Israel. Also revealing is who the state broadcaster looks to when deciding how to apply its editorial standards. BBC executives reportedly told the filmmakers they should not reference the United Nations or Amnesty International because they were supposedly not 'trusted independent organisations'. Meanwhile, the corporation openly and obsessively worried to the filmmakers about what pro-Israel lobbyists - such as social media activist David Collier and Camera, a pro-Israel media monitoring group - would say about their film on Gaza. The team was told that BBC News executives were 'very jumpy and paranoid' about coverage of Gaza. This follows a long and dishonourable tradition at the state broadcaster. In their 2011 book More Bad News From Israel, media scholars Greg Philo and Mike Berry reported a BBC producer telling them: 'We all fear the phone call from the Israeli embassy.' If you had been wondering why the BBC has been reflexively both-sidesing a genocide, here is a large part of the answer. Skewed coverage A damning report by the Centre for Media Monitoring last month analysed in detail the BBC's Gaza coverage in the year following Hamas's 7 October attack. It found a pattern of bias, double standards and silencing of Palestinian voices. These included the BBC giving 33 times more coverage to Israeli deaths as compared with Palestinian deaths; interviewing more than twice as many Israelis as Palestinians; asking 38 interviewees to condemn Hamas, but asking no one to condemn Israel's mass killing of civilians, or its attacks on hospitals and schools; and shutting down more than 100 interviewees who tried to refer to events in Gaza as a genocide. Only 0.5 percent of BBC articles provided any context for what was happening before 7 October 2023: that Israel had been illegally occupying the Palestinian territories for decades and besieging the enclave for 17 years. BBC bias: Attack on watchdog that skewered Gaza coverage is a feeble hit job Read More » Similarly, the BBC has barely reported the endless stream of genocidal statements from Israeli political and military leaders - a crucial ingredient in legally determining whether military actions constitute genocide. Nor has it mentioned other vital context, such as Israel's invocation of the Hannibal Directive on 7 October 2023, licensing it to kill its own citizens to prevent them from being taken captive; or its military's long-established Dahiya Doctrine, in which the mass destruction of civilian infrastructure - and with it, the likelihood of slaughtering civilians - is viewed as an effective way to deter resistance to its aggression. In the specified time period, the BBC covered Ukraine with twice as many articles as Gaza, even though the Gaza story was newer and Israeli crimes even graver than Russian ones. The corporation was twice as likely to use sympathetic language for Ukrainian victims than for Palestinian victims. Palestinians were usually described as having 'died' or been 'killed' in air strikes, without mention of who launched those strikes. Israeli victims, on the other hand, were 'massacred', 'slaughtered' and 'butchered'. None of these were editorial slip-ups. They were part of a systematic, long-term skewing of editorial coverage in Israel's favour - a clear breach of the BBC's impartiality guidelines and one that has created a permissive environment for genocide. BBC 'performing PR' Journalists at the BBC are known to be in rebellion. More than 100 signed a letter - anonymously for fear of reprisals - condemning the decision to scrap the documentary about Gaza doctors, saying it reflected a mix of 'fear' and 'anti-Palestinian racism' at the corporation. The BBC told MEE: 'Robust discussions amongst our editorial teams about our journalism are an essential part of the editorial process. We have ongoing discussions about coverage and listen to feedback from staff, and we think these conversations are best had internally.' The journalists, it seems, would prefer that these discussions are had out in the open. They wrote: 'As an organisation we have not offered any significant analysis of the UK government's involvement in the war on Palestinians. We have failed to report on weapons sales or their legal implications. These stories have instead been broken by the BBC's competitors.' They added: 'All too often it has felt that the BBC has been performing PR for the Israeli government and military.' They could have added, even more pertinently, that in the process, the BBC has been doing PR for the British establishment too. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer speaks during an interview with the BBC in London on 6 September 2024 (Benjamin Cremel/AFP) A former BBC press officer, Ben Murray, recently gave broader context to the meaning of the corporation's famed editorial 'impartiality'. His role, he wrote, had been a rearguard one to placate the Times, Telegraph, Sun, and most of all, the Daily Mail. These establishment outlets are owned by corporations and billionaires heavily invested in the very fossil fuel, 'defence' and tech industries Israel is central to lubricating. BBC executives, Murray noted, 'were rightfully fearful of these publications' influence, and often reacted in ways to appease them. Their task was to protect the BBC's funding model, and by extension, their prestigious jobs and generous salaries.' None of this went against the grain. As Murray points out, many senior BBC staff enjoyed private educations, have Oxbridge degrees, and have been 'fast-tracked up the corporate ladder'. They see their job as being 'to reinforce and maintain establishment viewpoints'. Editorial smokescreen If this weren't enough, senior BBC staff also have to look over their shoulders to the British government, which sets the corporation's funding through the TV licence fee. The government, no less than the BBC, needs to keep its main constituencies happy. No, not voters. Ministers, keen for favourable coverage, similarly dare not antagonise Israel-aligned media moguls. And equally, they cannot afford to alienate powerful US administrations that pledge an undying, unshakeable bond with Israel while projecting western power into the oil-rich Middle East. This is precisely why Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy was only too keen to jump on the Daily Mail bandwagon in calling for heads to roll at the BBC over the supposed 'failings' in its Gaza coverage. In response to the Johnston report, a spokesperson for the broadcaster told MEE: 'The BBC is taking fair, clear and appropriate action, based on the Review's findings to ensure accountability.' The BBC has not failed. It has done exactly what it is there to do: help the British government conceal the fact that there is a genocide going on in Gaza Another of Nandy's comments is worth noting. 'It makes me angry on behalf of the BBC staff and the whole creative industries in this country,' she said, apparently oblivious to the fact that many BBC journalists' fury is not over the confected scandals generated by pro-Israel lobbying groups and billionaire-owned media. They are appalled at the corporation's refusal to hold Israel or Nandy's own government accountable for the genocide in Gaza. In such circumstances, the BBC's professed commitment to 'impartiality' serves as nothing more than a smokescreen. In reality, the corporation acts as an echo chamber, amplifying and legitimising the interests of media tycoons, the British government and the Washington consensus, however much they flout the foundational principles of international law, human rights and basic decency. Anybody who stands outside that circle of influence - such as Palestinians and their supporters, anti-genocide activists, human rights advocates, and increasingly the UN and its legal organs, such as the ICC - is assumed by the BBC to be suspect. Such voices are likely to be marginalised, silenced or vilified. The BBC has not failed. It has done exactly what it is there to do: help the British government conceal the fact that there is a genocide going on in Gaza - one that the UK is knee-deep in assisting. The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.
Middle East Eye
2 hours ago
- Middle East Eye
Israeli settlers slaughter dozens of sheep in attack on Palestinian Bedouins
At dawn on Friday, groups of Israeli settlers slaughtered dozens of sheep and beat and stole several others in al-Miteh in the Jordan Valley, in the occupied West Bank. The attack forced two Palestinian families to evacuate their homes and relocate to al-Auja, near the city of Jericho. This incident is part of a growing pattern of settler violence targeting Bedouin communities, aimed at driving them from lands coveted by Israeli settlers. The settlers frequently attack livestock as a way to destroy the livelihood of Palestinian families and facilitate the seizure of their lands. Mahmoud Kaabneh, one of the residents forced to flee, told Middle East Eye that on Thursday evening, settlers attacked the home of his brother Salem and attempted to steal donkeys. When the family intervened to stop them, more settlers arrived and began assaulting the homes of Salem and his cousin Suleiman, along with their families. The settlers then opened the sheep pen and stole around 350 sheep. Residents quickly gathered to try to recover the livestock. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters "The Israeli army was present with the settlers and did nothing," Kaabneh said. "But when the residents tried to rescue the livestock, the soldiers attacked the Palestinians instead and chased us down. They arrested 20 men and beat them severely for four hours." 'We were left with nothing' In the early morning hours, residents continued searching for their sheep and discovered that settlers had slaughtered dozens of them. "More than 100 sheep were killed - some slaughtered with knives, others beaten to death, and many left with deep wounds. Some of them were stolen," Kaabneh said. He added that a man from the area was hit on the head with an iron pipe while trying to fend off the settlers. When an ambulance arrived, Israeli soldiers detained him for hours at the Hamra checkpoint near Tubas, preventing him from being transported to hospital. Palestinians left 'without shelter and water' as settlers empty West Bank village Read More » Kaabneh and his brothers, who live nearby, were forced to leave their homes and leave the area after the attack - the fifth time they've been displaced due to settler violence. "We've been displaced since 13 October 2023,' he said. "Each time we're attacked, our children and women are beaten, our sheep stolen. Once, they took everything we owned - our homes, belongings - and we were left with nothing but the clothes on our backs." According to local residents, settler attacks are a near-daily occurrence in the area, but this latest assault was among the most violent, spreading fear among Bedouin families. Aref Daraghmeh, a local anti-settlement activist, said at least 30 Bedouin families have been forced to leave the Jordan Valley due to increased settler violence since the start of the war on Gaza, including 20 families in the past three months alone. Recently, settlers have begun a tactic known locally as flag-based settlement, in which they plant an Israeli flag near the tents of Palestinian residents. If the flag is disturbed or even blown over by the wind, settlers use it as a pretext to attack Palestinians. This tactic has terrified residents, Daraghmeh told MEE, adding that settlers have also been using tractors to ram into homes and animal shelters. "There is no one to protect the Palestinians here," Daraghmeh said. "The Israeli army is supporting the settlers in their attempt to completely evacuate the Jordan Valley of its residents."
The National
2 hours ago
- The National
'We have enough wars': Israeli experts doubt their country's strategy after bombing of Syria
Israeli experts, including a former government official, have questioned the rationale of the country's latest military intervention in Syria, warning it achieved little, risks a wider sectarian war and damages hopes of stability in Damascus. Israel's air strikes this week on Sweida in southern Syria, and the Defence Ministry building in central Damascus, followed days of violence between Druze, Bedouin tribes and pro-government forces that formed the latest challenge for President Ahmad Al Shara's government. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government justified its strikes on grounds that combine national security with protection of the Druze, a religious minority deeply embedded in both Syria and Israel, as well as Jordan and Lebanon. But the escalation to military action was unnecessary, some Israelis believe. 'Israel could have sent appeasing messages to Ahmad Al Shara, drafting a list of mutually agreed upon understandings and even delineating red lines, rather than bomb for no apparent reason and attaining nothing,' Alon Pinkas, a chief of staff to multiple former Israeli foreign ministers, told The National. The violence in Sweida began with skirmishes including an ambush by Bedouin gunmen on a truck and kidnappings by Druze militiamen. Syrian government forces intervened in an offensive in which more than 200 Druze, including civilians, have been killed. Scores of Bedouins and government security forces have also been killed, and civil society organisations have accused all sides of atrocities, including killings, torture, and degrading treatment. On Thursday, the UK-based Syrian Observatory of Human Rights monitoring group claimed a total of 594 people had been killed in the violence since Sunday. According to Israeli military officials, their country's strikes were designed to send messages to Mr Al Shara's government that Israel will act to defend a community that is kin to its own citizens. The Druze, whose faith emerged from a branch of Islam in the 11th century, number around 150,000 people in Israel and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Many serve in the Israeli military, as well as in the cabinet and parliament. There are around 800,000 Druze registered as living in Syria, mostly in the southern Sweida governorate, bordering Jordan. 'The Druze leaders approached the leaders in Israel to support the Druze in Syria and take a position to save them from this tragedy and this situation that they are in,' Col Hamada Ganem, a Druze and a former commander of the Israeli military's Gaza Strip Northern Brigade, told The National. 'The goal here was to protect the Syrian Druze. There was no Israeli goal against the Syrian state.' Mr Netanyahu's government gave the green light for military intervention after pressure from Israel's Druze population to act, and the desire to portray a show of force, observers said. 'In Israel, there are always domestic considerations, political considerations,' Professor Eyal Zisser, Vice Rector of Tel Aviv University and an expert on Syria, told The National. 'The Druze community in Israel is putting pressure, on the one hand, and also, whenever you can show that you are strong, why not?' If Al Shara is a statesman, he must defend his people, especially the minorities - they are an indispensable part of Syria Col Hamada Ganem, Druze former Israeli military commander Doubts over Al Shara In interviews, Israeli officials and academics painted a picture of a deep uncertainty in the country over the willingness and ability of Mr Al Shara's government in Damascus to prevent violence or to enact the vision he claims to seek of an inclusive and stable Syria. Colonel Ganem accused Mr Al Shara of both unwillingness and inability to protect Syria's minorities. 'If he is a statesman, he must defend his people, especially the minorities – they are an indispensable part of Syria,' he said. In a speech on Thursday, Mr Al Shara said the Druze were 'a fundamental part of the fabric' of Syria, and rejected any attempt for them to be 'dragged' into the hands of what he called 'an external party'. Syria's government is, 'keen on holding accountable those who transgressed and abused our Druze people', he added. Within Israel, some support and see the logic behind military intervention in Syria. Since the fall of the Bashar Al Assad regime last December, Israel has encroached on territory in a UN-controlled buffer in the Golan Heights, a rocky plateau recognised by most of the international community as Syrian territory. It has carried out air strikes against what it says were remnants of the former regime's military infrastructure. The presence of radical Islamist fighters in Syria's new armed forces rings alarm bells for many Israelis. They include foreign militants, including ethnic Turkic Uighurs from the Turkistan Islamic Party, which aims to form an Islamic state in Central Asia. Israel wants demilitarisation of southern Syria to prevent groups it sees as a national security threat replacing the Iran-aligned militias who once held positions there. The Tehran-backed groups fled with the fall of the Assad regime. Search for stability Others, while wary of the Syrian government's lack of monopoly on force, raise concerns about the long-term impact of Israeli military intervention. 'Let's focus on the interests of everyone to have stability,' Prof Zisser said. 'That's the basic thing, and such actions are against the idea of having stability.' Israel's operations this week have sparked Syrian and international condemnation, and are widely seen as further destabilising an already fragile situation. The strikes killed and injured several civilians, said Federico Jachetti, the Norwegian Refugee Council's Syria country office director. 'The international community must make it clear that such actions are unacceptable, represent a violation of international law, and directly contribute to Syria's instability,' he said. Many Israelis caution against dragging the country into another war in Syria, or of exacerbating tensions within and between sects, when violations have been committed on all sides. I don't think we need to be on the side of anyone committing violations. I think we need to do everything we can to stop this. Dr Nir Boms, Israeli expert on Syria Hikmat Al Hijri, the main figure in a triumvirate that constitutes the Druze spiritual leadership, earlier this week called for 'international protection' from 'all countries'. Other Druze leaders have cautioned against such moves, fearing that it may undermine integration. 'There absolutely was a massacre, but it was not just a Druze massacre,' Dr Nir Boms, director of the Syria Forum at Tel Aviv University's Moshe Dayan Centre, told The National, of this week's violence. 'I don't think we need to be on the side of anyone committing violations. I think we need to do everything we can to stop this.' While maintaining that Israel's intervention saved Druze lives in Syria, he cautioned against more warfare. 'I think Israel saved Druze lives with what it did,' Mr Boms added. 'But I don't want to put Israel in the middle of a Syrian sectarian war. For heaven's sake, we have enough wars of our own.' Netanyahu's politics Some go further, believing that Israel's intentions in Syria are less related to security and more to Mr Netanyahu's desire to stay in power. 'Netanyahu is infatuated with his 'wartime prime ministership' and believes that perpetuating the war − Gaza, Houthis, Iran and now Syria − shields him politically,' Mr Pinkas said. 'He deludes himself that he is actually remodelling the Middle East landscape solely through the use of military power.' Rather than manoeuvring among sects in Syria, Israel needs to support Mr Al Shara's stated aims to build an inclusive state that works for all its citizens, Mr Boms added. 'Israel actually has a vast interest in Ahmad Al Shara succeeding,' he said. 'A Syria that will be able to make peace from the inside will make peace from the outside.' Israel and the US have said they want Syria to join the Abraham Accords, a set of agreements that established diplomatic relations between Israel and Arab-majority countries. But such a move may face significant popular opposition, given the Israeli attacks on Syria in the past seven months. US pressure on Israel is the most likely deterrent to stop further military action in Syria, as President Donald Trump has lifted sanctions and appears charmed by Mr Al Shara, Prof Zisser said. 'Netanyahu does whatever Trump tells him to do,' he said. 'So, if this is an American dictate, it will happen.' Mr Netanyahu on Thursday framed the Israeli strikes as the catalyst for a ceasefire in Sweida. The cessation in hostilities came after US pressure for the fighting to end. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington had communicated with 'all parties' involved in the clashes in Syria and 'agreed on specific steps' to halt the violence. 'This will require all parties to deliver on the commitments they have made and this is what we fully expect them to do,' he wrote on X. For now, the future relationship between Israel and Syria remains unclear. One option is the return to a 1974 agreement between the two nations that saw the creation of a UN-patrolled buffer zone between armistice lines on the Golan Heights. But a complication is Israel's occupation of territory within that separation zone since the Assad regime fell. 'This government will not do it,' Mr Pinkas said. 'But before anything can be considered it remains to be seen how Al Shara consolidates power and extends sovereignty. Only then will Israel conceivably return to the 1974 armistice lines.'
