These developments come against a backdrop of renewed violence in the Middle East. Two anti-Israeli attacks killed three people on Friday.
Israel announced overnight from Saturday to Sunday that it had struck Syria in response to rocket fire towards the annexed part of the Golan Heights, after similar fire from neighboring Lebanon and the Gaza Strip in recent days.
Israeli artillery targeted “the region of Syria from which rockets were fired”, the Israeli army reported, indicating that it also used a drone.
A Syrian military source interviewed by the official Syrian agency Sana confirmed the Israeli fire: “At around 5 a.m. this morning, the Israeli enemy fired several projectiles from the occupied Golan, targeting several areas in southern” Syria.
Shots “intercepted” by the Syrian anti-aircraft defense
These strikes caused “material damage”, said this source, adding that some projectiles had been “intercepted” by the Syrian anti-aircraft defense.
These developments come against a backdrop of renewed violence in the Middle East. Two anti-Israeli attacks killed three people on Friday.
According to the Israeli army, at least one of the rockets fired from Syria was intercepted by Israeli anti-aircraft defenses and two fell on waste ground in the part of the Golan Heights annexed by Israel after being conquered in 1967.
It is a strategic region, patrolled by its soldiers and also bordering Lebanon.
Intensification of Israeli raids in Syria
On Thursday, around 30 rockets were fired from Lebanon into Israel, injuring one person and causing material damage. The Israeli army retaliated by carrying out strikes on Gaza and southern Lebanon.
The Israeli army claimed that the unclaimed shots from Lebanon were “Palestinian”, and most likely from the Islamist movement Hamas, in power in the Gaza Strip. This is an unprecedented escalation on the Israeli-Lebanese front since 2006.
The two countries are technically in a state of war after different conflicts and the ceasefire line is controlled by the United Nations Interim Force (UNIFIL), deployed in southern Lebanon.
On the Syrian side, Israel has recently intensified its raids targeting in particular the positions of pro-Iran groups, its number one enemy.
Car bombing in Tel Aviv
On Friday evening, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “ordered the police to mobilize all reserve units of the border police, and the (army) to mobilize additional forces”, after an attack on the ram car on the waterfront of Tel Aviv.
An Italian tourist was killed and seven others, aged 17 to 74, injured in the attack, which occurred on a Sabbath evening and during the week of Passover.
Police said the 45-year-old driver who was shot was from the Arab town of Kfar Kassem in central Israel.
Earlier on Friday, two sisters from the Israeli settlement of Efrat, aged 16 and 20 and holders of Israeli and British nationalities, were killed and their mother seriously injured in a Palestinian attack on their car in the West Bank, occupied Palestinian territory by Israel since 1967.
The Israeli police said four reserve Border Police battalions would be deployed to city centers on Sunday, in addition to the units already mobilized in the mixed city of Lod and in the Jerusalem area.
General mobilization
The Ministry of Defense confirmed on Saturday evening that it was mobilizing soldiers to support the police and announced that it would tighten entry restrictions into Israel for Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza Strip, in particular workers.
The current outbreak of fever indeed follows violence on Wednesday on the esplanade of the Mosques, the third holiest site in Islam and the holiest site in Judaism, also the epicenter of tensions in the Holy City.
Israeli forces broke into the Al-Aqsa mosque to dislodge worshipers gathered for night prayers in the middle of Ramadan, prompting widespread condemnation.
Benjamin Netanyahu said the forces were “forced to act to restore order” in the face of “extremists” barricaded in the mosque. Hamas, which has waged several wars against Israel, denounced an “unprecedented crime”.
Qatar activism
Qatar, which has previously mediated between Israel and the ruling Hamas in Gaza, is “working towards de-escalation”, a Qatari official told AFP on Friday, on condition of anonymity.
Since the beginning of January, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has claimed the lives of at least 92 Palestinians, 18 Israelis, a Ukrainian and an Italian, according to a tally compiled from official Israeli and Palestinian sources.
These figures include, on the Palestinian side, combatants and civilians, including minors, and on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, including minors, and three members of the Arab minority.
