US Air Strikes Aimed at Hindering Syrian Support for Palestine
© AFP 2023 / DELIL SOULEIMAN
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Both Israel and the US have escalated their aggression against Syria since October 7, when the Palestinian Hamas movement staged a mass armed breakout from the besieged Gaza Strip. Investigative journalist Vanessa Beeley said the two countries were trying to provoke a full-scale military confrontation.
The US is ramping up air attacks on Syria in a bid to end Syria's decades-long support for Palestinian liberation: investigative journalist Vanessa Beeley told Sputnik that the US was using its aircraft based in the Middle East, along with its proxy forces inside Syria, to destabilize the Arab republic.
"What we're seeing is what we've seen throughout the regime change war against Syria since 2011," Beeley said. "We've seen the US activating the ISIS* proxy forces to carry out attacks, particularly in the eastern districts to the east of Homs."
The response from President Bashar al-Assad's government has been to slowly increase pressure on the US troops illegally occupying north-east Syria's oil and gas fields.
"What we're now seeing is direct engagement between the US and the Syrian Arab Army," Beeley stressed. "This hasn't really happened before the attacks on the American illegal American occupation bases that are daily stealing Syrian oil from the north east and destroying agricultural resources."
The US air raids have targeted border crossings used as a lifeline to the sanctions-hit country from its allies Iraq and Iran.
"In the last two or three days, we've seen direct clashes between Syria and our army military and the US forces to the west of the Euphrates," Beeley said. "We've also seen the US attacking the commercial area on the border with Iraq, which is one of the few open border crossings between Syria and Iraq that allows humanitarian aid and supplies into Syria from Iran and Iraq."
The journalist said the US escalation may backfire on its small forces in Syria.
"What we've been seeing are in the Conoco American occupation base, 15 missiles launched by the Syrian Arab Army directly because the launching system is only used by the Syrian Arab Army," Beeley said. "So we can only conclude that now the Syrian Arab Army is changing the rules of engagement. It has shot down a US drone also in the last few days."
The situation on Syria's disputed frontier with Israel has also heated up.
"Syria has now given permission to the Palestinian factions in the Syrian Golan [Heights] territory to target the Israeli-occupied Golan settlements with missiles," Beeley said.
13 November 2023, 10:00 GMT
The journalist said Israel's recent attacks on Damascus and Aleppo airports were part of an escalation of existing conflicts in the region.
"Israel's policy is almost always to provoke a reaction. And then when it receives the reaction, it can claim self-defense to attack its aggressor," Beeley said. "That is very much what Israel has been doing for the last 12 years here in Syria."
She noted that the two airports were now closed, more du to the risk of further air attacks than damage to the runways, as "Syria is not prepared to put civilian aircraft at risk."
"Israel will often use civilian aircraft as cover for their incoming attack, putting civilian airliners at risk. That's been a very, very standard policy for Israel," Beeley noted. "They've also been attacking Syrian Arab Army positions both to the south of Damascus, even as far south as Suwayda, very recently attacking defense capabilities and radar equipment."
She argued that was in preparation for a looming military escalation. "They believe that is going to come between Israel and Syria at some point. So they've been probing Syria's defense."
* Islamic State (ISIS or Daesh) is an international terrorist organization banned in Russia and by United Nation Security Council resolutions.
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