Israel continues strikes and raids in Syria and Lebanon despite diplomacy push
Israeli artillery attacks, air raids and ground incursions continued on Wednesday in southern Syria and southern Lebanon, even as diplomatic efforts sought to reduce the violence. In Syria, shelling hit a hill near Beit Jinn in the western Damascus countryside, while reports said Israeli soldiers also raided and searched a house in Taranja in Quneitra countryside. The latest activity adds to a pattern of repeated military pressure across both fronts.
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Witnesses said the shelling struck the strategic Bat al-Warda hill near Beit Jinn late on Wednesday. Separately, Syria's state television reported that soldiers entered Taranja and searched a house there. The reported actions came days after Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani met Israeli intelligence officials in Jordan in talks mediated by the United States, which Damascus said were intended to stop continued attacks, arrests and targeting operations inside Syria.
The Beit Jinn area has been hit repeatedly in recent months, according to reporting from Damascus. That includes an Israeli drone strike on a vehicle in the town on Saturday, and a ground raid last year that killed at least 13 people, including children. In Lebanon, Israeli forces also launched air attacks on al-Mansouri in the Tyre district and on Sarbine in the Bint Jbeil district late on Wednesday, extending the scope of the military activity beyond Syria.
The strikes matter because they come while Washington is trying to keep diplomacy alive between Syrian and Israeli officials. They also underline how the conflict has widened beyond a single border area, with Israeli operations now affecting communities in both southern Syria and southern Lebanon. For Damascus, the attacks are part of a broader challenge to sovereignty and security after years of war and shifting control along its southern frontier.
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Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes in Syria since the overthrow of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in December 2024. It has also deployed troops into a United Nations-patrolled buffer zone that for decades separated Israeli and Syrian forces in the occupied Golan Heights. The latest escalation also follows Israel's bombing of a Syrian airbase near the Turkish border, which it said was linked to an alleged Turkish effort to establish a military presence there; both Damascus and Ankara deny that claim.
Analysts quoted in the reporting said they did not expect the Syria-Israel talks to produce a breakthrough. One said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was seeking to escalate in more than one place ahead of the country's general election in October, in the hope of winning support from right-wing and far-right voters. What remains unclear is whether the US-mediated contacts in Jordan can slow the attacks or whether the pattern of strikes, raids and retaliatory tensions will continue in the coming days.
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