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Israel remains cautious about taking sides publicly while preparing itself for a range of scenarios.
By Yaakov Lappin, JNS
Since Nov. 27, the Syrian civil war has seen a resurgence of hostilities that directly threatens the stability of President Bashar Assad’s regime, following an offensive launched by Sunni rebels from Idlib in northwestern Syria.
The renewed fighting has seen the rebels quickly take Aleppo and advance further south, and is being closely monitored by Israel.
It is already drawing in Russia, which is conducting airstrikes on the Sunni forces, while unconfirmed reports of strikes by an unidentified air force targeted positions of Iran-backed militias in Deir Ezzor, northeastern Syria, an area used by Shi’ite militias to cross into Syria from Iraq.
At the forefront of the renewed offensive against Assad’s forces is Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a Sunni Islamist organization led by the 43-year-old Abu Mohammed al-Jolani.
Formerly affiliated with al-Qaeda in Syria and known as Jabhat al-Nusra before breaking ties with al-Qaeda, HTS has become the primary umbrella force challenging the Syrian government in the Idlib region.
Israel remains cautious about taking sides publicly, while preparing itself for a range of scenarios.
Lt. Col. (res.) Marco Moreno, a former senior officer in the IDF’s Human Intelligence Unit 504 who was responsible for the Lebanon and Syria arenas, and the founder and commander of “Operation Good Neighbor” from 2012 to 2016, which provided humanitarian aid to Syrians during the civil war, directly linked current events in that country with the hammer blows sustained by Hezbollah and the Shi’ite axis in neighboring Lebanon.
“The rebels have been waiting with plans for a long time, and once they saw that we weakened and harmed Hezbollah in Lebanon—and in Syria—they took advantage of the opportunity to attack,” Moreno told JNS on Sunday.
Moreno noted that the direct impact on Israel at this stage is minor, since the fighting is not occurring close to the border in southern Syria.
‘Syria’s Philadelphi Corridor’
He also noted that the Assad regime has played a highly destructive and dangerous role for Israel’s security over the years, supplying highly advanced, strategic weaponry to Hezbollah.
“The Assad regime allowed Syria to be the Philadelphi Corridor [the Gazan area bordering Sinai used to smuggle weapons] on steroids,” said Moreno.
Many of the weapons Hezbollah used against Israel in the recent war came from Syria, he said. “When I say strategic weaponry was smuggled from Syria, I mean strategic, without going into further details,” he added.
The rebels, he said, are an assortment of groups including extremist jihadists.
“As someone who ran ‘Operation Good Neighbor’ in the Golan Heights, I know the rebels well—the good and the less good. I think that when the rebellion reaches southern Syria, the Golan Heights, it could create a security challenge on the border. The Israel Defense Forces will have the needed skills, acquired from the past, to deal with this event,” Moreno said.
Israel will likely be able to set up arrangements, not all of them necessarily public, with rebel groups, he assessed.
“Once Syria is removed from the Shi’ite axis, the Iranian axis will be severely harmed. The next step will be the Iranian axis itself,” he said. “This is something that will project on all of the arenas, including Hamas and Hezbollah.”
Regarding concerns that sites belonging to the Syrian Scientific Studies and Research Center, which, in cooperation with Iran develops precise missiles, and according to reports, chemical weapons, could fall into the hands of jihadists, Moreno said, “Israeli intelligence agencies would have to monitor this, and if needed, act in this scenario.”
He added that if rebels destroy sites used to supply Hezbollah with weapons, this could also benefit Israel.
Israeli intelligence superiority is well established in the northern arena, he argued.
Addressing the Turkish role, Moreno said that Ankara appears to be motivated in backing a number of rebel groups by the goal of moving millions of Sunni refugees who have found haven in Turkey back to Syrian soil, and perhaps to initiate this maneuver before the second Trump administration is sworn in.
Turkey might also sense an opportunity to push the Kurds back from the Turkish border, he added.
“We’re in the Middle East and I personally believe that this chaos is good, it creates opportunities – if one knows how to exploit them,” said Moreno.
Essentially al-Qaeda or ISIS
Brig. Gen. (res.) Dedy Simhi, former chief of staff of the IDF Home Front Command, told JNS on Sunday that the complete collapse of Assad’s regime would “not good for Israel because the alternative might be that these Sunni jihadists, essentially al-Qaeda or ISIS in some form, could rise.”
He added, “I would prefer Assad weakened and bleeding in power rather than Syria completely falling apart. … Israel must sit on the sidelines for now, avoid intervention, and be prepared for anything that might happen.”
Israel’s interest, he argued, is not for Syria to turn into Yemen or Iraq, or Libya.
Simhi added that the harm caused to Hezbollah and to Hamas, as well as the destruction of the entire Iranian air defense array on Oct. 26 by the Israeli Air Force, and the Israeli strikes on Yemen, have all weakened the Shi’ite axis.
This led the Sunni rebels to decide to take advantage of the weakness of their enemy, that same Shi’ite axis, and to attack.
“There are other considerations here too,” he added. “Turkey is supporting the rebels—they want to return the four million Syrian refugees to northern Syria.”
Simhi echoed Moreno’s assessment that Israel will be capable of detecting scenarios of advanced weaponry falling into jihadi hands and acting in time if necessary.
Iran and Russia embarrassed
According to a report by Mako on Sunday, “In Iran and Russia, the two biggest patrons of Assad since the middle of the previous decade, it is evident that they were surprised and very embarrassed by the collapse of the Syrian army forces. Direct Iranian and Russian assets were severely damaged in the recent battles, and now there is a frantic effort to try and regain control.”
Iranian interests have suffered notably. “On Wednesday night, Iranian General Qomars Furuhashi, a very senior official in the Quds Force of the Revolutionary Guards, was eliminated on the outskirts of Aleppo,” Mako reported.
The Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies provided an in-depth analysis of HTS in August 2023.
The organization has changed significantly since its al-Qaeda-affiliated days, the report argued. “HTS’s current political-religious ideology frames the group as strictly Syria-focused and religiously moderate,” the center reported.
Despite efforts to rebrand, concerns persist about HTS’s authoritarian control and threats. “HTS has shown limited tolerance for political dissent, reacting swiftly and harshly to any protests or civilian complaints,” the analysis highlighted.
The degree to which the group has the capacity to govern and the nature of its interactions with transnational terrorist groups remain points of contention.
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