Source: korybko.substack.com
The trend of Israel striking civilian areas in Syria as part of its regional assassination spree threatens to further destabilize the Arab Republic.
Israel bombed a civilian district in Damascus on Tuesday in its latest attack against the Arab Republic. RT cited Saudi media to report that the target was “a Hezbollah official in charge of Unit 4400, which allegedly supplies the Lebanese Shia militia with weapons from Iran.” It’s rare that Israel strikes civilian areas in Syria, yet it’s increasingly begun to do so since the start of the latest Israeli-Lebanese War. Here are five takeaways from this development:
1. Israel Is On A Regional Assassination Spree
The past month has seen the Mossad leveraging its intelligence superiority over the Resistance to assassinate dozens of their members, first with pager bombs and then with airstrikes, despite predictable collateral damage to civilians. The latest bombing of Damascus is the natural evolution of this trend and signals that Israel will go to any length, including endangering civilians, to take out its targets. The Syrian capital might soon be hit as frequently as the Lebanese one if enough targets are discovered.
2. The S-300s Were Once Again Silent
Russia’s long-delayed dispatch of the S-300s to Syria in late 2018 was hyped up as a game-changer but they’ve yet to be used even once despite hundreds of Israeli bombings since then. These analyses here, here, and here shed more light on why that is, but it’s sufficient for casual readers to know that Russia won’t allow Syria to use them since it doesn’t want to provoke Israel. The complex calculations articulated in the preceding analyses still remain in place despite Israel’s intensified bombing campaign.