Israeli forces in southern Syria raided a village and opened fire when they were confronted by residents on Friday, killing at least 13, Syrian officials said, as Israel fights on a number of fronts while the shaky ceasefire in Gaza moves forward.
Syria’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the attack was “a horrific massacre” and that women and children were among those killed.
The Syrian state news agency SANA said Israeli forces entered the village of Beit Jin aiming to detain local men and opened heavy fire after being confronted by residents. Dozens of families fled the area.
Israel said Friday it conducted an operation to apprehend suspects from the Jamaa Islamiya militant group in Beit Jin who were allegedly planning IED and rocket attacks into Israel. It said other militants opened fire at the troops, injuring six, and that troops returned fire, including bringing in air support. Israel said the operation had concluded, all of the suspects were apprehended and a number of militants were killed but did not provide evidence of these allegations.
A local official in the village, Walid Okasha, told The Associated Press that those killed were civilians. Among the dead were a man, his wife, his two children and his brother as well as another man who had gotten married the day before.
“The situation is miserable,” he said.
Firas Daher, a Beit Jin resident, told The Associated Press that troops moved in around 3 a.m. local time and were met by “slight resistance, with light weapons.” Troops responded with drones and helicopters and fire from heavy machine guns.
“Whenever anyone would move inside the village or any car would move, it would get hit. When we tried to take injured people to the hospital, they would hit the car carrying them,” he said.
In a previous raid on Beit Jin in June, Israeli forces captured several people who they said were Hamas members — a characterization disputed by residents — and killed a man whose family said had a history of schizophrenia.
Previous raids met by armed residents
Since the fall of former Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad in December 2024, Israeli forces have held a slice of southern Syria that was previously a UN-patrolled buffer zone under a 1974 disengagement agreement. Troops have regularly carried out operations in villages and towns inside and outside the zone, including raids snatching people it says are suspected militants. Israel has also launched hundreds of airstrikes on Syrian military sites and pushed for a demilitarized zone south of Damascus.
Israeli raids have several times been met by armed local residents. In April, troops raided the town of Nawa, and when confronted by residents, the military carried out airstrikes in the town, killing nine people. A month earlier, Israeli forces killed six people in the village of Koayiah in similar clashes during a raid.
WATCH | 13 killed in strike on refugee camp:
An Israeli strike on the Ain al-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp in southern Lebanon killed 13 people and wounded several others, the Lebanese Health Ministry said Wednesday. The Israeli military said it struck Hamas militants who it said were operating in a training compound there. Hamas said the strike targeted an open sports field used by residents of the camp.
In a previous raid on Beit Jin in June, Israeli forces seized several people who they said were Hamas members — a characterization disputed by residents — and killed a man whose family said had a history of schizophrenia.
Israel says it seized the 400-square-kilometre demilitarized buffer zone in southern Syria in a pre-emptive move to prevent militants from moving into the area after Islamist insurgents toppled Assad. It says the move is temporary, but critics accuse Israel of taking advantage of Syria’s turmoil for a land grab.
Israel still controls the Golan Heights that it captured from Syria during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and later annexed — a move not recognized by most of the international community.
Syria calls for ‘urgent action’
Syrian officials have condemned the Israeli incursions as a violation of Syria’s sovereignty. On Friday the government called for the international community to take “urgent action” to halt Israeli incursions.
Ongoing conflicts in the region have fuelled concerns that unrest could spill over and undermine the fragile truce in Gaza.
The deaths in Syria followed a series of strikes by Israel’s air force in parts of southern Lebanon on Thursday. Israel says its ongoing strikes are aimed at preventing Hezbollah from rebuilding after a devastating war last year ended with a ceasefire.
The United Nations on Tuesday said Israel had killed at least 127 civilians, including children, in its strikes on Lebanon since the ceasefire a year ago. Things escalated earlier this week with a rare strike in Lebanon’s capital, Beirut, killing a senior Hezbollah official whom Israel described as the group’s chief of staff.
Najat Rochdi, the UN’s Deputy Special Envoy for Syria, condemned Israel’s incursion as “a grave and unacceptable violation of Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, further destabilizing an already fragile environment.”
Syrian and Israeli officials have met a half-dozen times for U.S.-brokered talks on a security deal to bring stability to the border region but negotiations have been frozen since September.
