Connect with us

RSS

‘Israel Doesn’t Want a Stable Syria’: The Media Uses Upheaval to Falsely Slander Israel

Rebel fighters holds weapons at the Citadel of Aleppo, after Syrian rebels announced that they have ousted Bashar al-Assad, in Aleppo, Syria, Dec. 9, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Karam al-Masri

The Independent’s world affairs editor, Sam Kiley, has a long history of reporting from the Middle East for several mainstream media outlets including CNN, Sky News, and London’s Evening Standard. Despite presenting himself as something of an expert, his flawed judgment was most famously on display in 2002, when Kiley conjured up witnesses to speak of Israel’s “staggering brutality and callous murder” in Jenin when the media libeled Israel for a massacre that never was.

Taking on the dramatic fall of the Assad regime in Syria for The Independent, Kiley’s analysis includes the following:

Israel doesn’t want a stable Syria, as the Jewish state has occupied the Syrian Golan Heights since 1967, and captured more in 1973. It won’t ever allow Damascus to return to the eastern banks of the Sea of Galilee.

Israel “doesn’t want a stable Syria.”

Really?

History and common sense suggest otherwise.

1. While the Golan Heights has suffered rocket attacks, including the deadly attack that killed 12 children in the Druze town of Majdal Shams in July 2024, that rocket was fired by Hezbollah from Lebanon. Israel’s border with Syria has actually been one of its quietest over many decades with any security incidents few and far between — stability that has benefited Israel.

2. In the aftermath of the 1973 Yom Kippur War, Israel and Syria signed the 1974 Agreement on Disengagement, which until now has been the longest successful continuous agreement Israel has ever had with an Arab country. That Israel has reacted to the end of the Assad regime by moving forces into the buffer zone to temporarily secure the area of the Syrian Golan where the Syrian Army has fled is a testament to the stability that the agreement brought for some five decades.

3. When it comes to Bashar al-Assad, for Israeli policymakers, Assad may be the better devil you know. Granted, Assad was a despicable dictator, but he was a known and relatively predictable actor whose primary interest in recent years was his regime’s survival. With Assad gone, Israel is faced with chaos in Syria and a potential takeover by hostile jihadist groups. While Islamist rebel leader Abu Mohammed al-Jolani has attempted to portray himself and his forces as relative moderates, footage of a rebel spokesman surrounded by gunmen stating, “From here to Jerusalem. We’re coming for Jerusalem. Patience, people of Gaza, patience,” illustrates the potential dangers from Syria’s new rulers. Israel certainly does not benefit from the instability in Syria.

But then maybe Kiley’s interpretation is based on his own prejudices when it comes to the Jewish state.

He stresses that Israel captured more of the Golan Heights in 1973. What he doesn’t mention is that, as part of the aforementioned Agreement on Disengagement, Israel returned all of that extra territory — an inconvenient truth that doesn’t fit with Kiley’s portrayal of Israel as an aggressive colonizer.

There’s a reason Israel has annexed the Golan Heights and it’s not the land grab that Kiley implies. Prior to 1967, the strategic plateau that sits some 8,700 feet above Israel allowed Syria to dominate Israel’s northernmost communities. Syrian artillery fire regularly plagued northern Israel, and intermittent hostilities broke out, with both sides making incursions into the other’s territory.

Syrian forces regularly attacked Israeli farmers. Between 1950 and 1967, approximately 370 Israelis were hit by Syrian fire, with 121 killed.

After taking the territory in the defensive Six-Day War, the height advantage and strategic location afforded by the Golan Heights ensured that the territory could no longer be used to fire on northern Israel. This is why there is almost wall-to-wall opposition to giving the territory to Syria — whether it is governed by a dictator like Bashar al-Assad or jihadists who could potentially allow extremist groups to build terror infrastructure on Israel’s border in the same way that Hamas and Hezbollah did from Gaza and Lebanon respectively.

Ultimately, Sam Kiley’s “analysis” is both flawed and prejudiced. When it comes to Israel, for a world affairs editor, Kiley appears to have a loose grip on world affairs.

The author is the Editorial Director of HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.

The post ‘Israel Doesn’t Want a Stable Syria’: The Media Uses Upheaval to Falsely Slander Israel first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Continue Reading

RSS

Israeli Strike on Tehran Kills Bodyguard of Slain Hezbollah Chief

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi lays a wreath as he visits the burial site of former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, on the outskirts of Beirut, Lebanon, June 3, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir

A member of Lebanese armed group Hezbollah was killed in an Israeli air strike on Tehran alongside a member of an Iran-aligned Iraqi armed group, a senior Lebanese security source told Reuters and the Iraqi group said on Saturday.

The source identified the Hezbollah member as Abu Ali Khalil, who had served as a bodyguard for Hezbollah’s slain chief Hassan Nasrallah. The source said Khalil had been on a religious pilgrimage to Iraq when he met up with a member of the Kataeb Sayyed Al-Shuhada group.

They traveled together to Tehran and were both killed in an Israeli strike there, along with Khalil’s son, the senior security source said. Hezbollah has not joined in Iran’s air strikes against Israel from Lebanon.

Kataeb Sayyed Al-Shuhada published a statement confirming that both the head of its security unit and Khalil had been killed in an Israeli strike.

Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli aerial attack on Beirut’s southern suburbs in September.

Israel and Iran have been trading strikes for nine consecutive days since Israel launched attacks on Iran, saying Tehran was on the verge of developing nuclear weapons. Iran has said it does not seek nuclear weapons.

The post Israeli Strike on Tehran Kills Bodyguard of Slain Hezbollah Chief first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Continue Reading

RSS

Hamas Financial Officer and Commander Eliminated by IDF in the Gaza Strip

Israeli soldiers operate during a ground operation in the southern Gaza Strip, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, July 3, 2024. Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg/Pool via REUTERS

i24 News – The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), in cooperation with the General Security Service (Shin Bet), announced on Friday the killing of Ibrahim Abu Shamala, a senior financial official in Hamas’ military wing.

The operation took place on June 17th in the central Gaza Strip.

Abu Shamala held several key positions, including financial officer for Hamas’ military wing and assistant to Marwan Issa, the deputy commander of Hamas’ military wing until his elimination in March 2024.

He was responsible for managing all the financial resources of Hamas’ military wing in Gaza, overseeing the planning and execution of the group’s war budget. This involved handling and smuggling millions of dollars into the Gaza Strip to fund Hamas’ military operations.

The post Hamas Financial Officer and Commander Eliminated by IDF in the Gaza Strip first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Continue Reading

RSS

Report: Wary of Assassination by Israel, Khamenei Names 3 Potential Successors

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei waves during a meeting in Tehran, Iran, May 20, 2025. Photo: Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS

i24 News – Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei named three senior clerics as candidates to succeed him should he be killed, the New York Times reported on Saturday citing unnamed Iranian officials. It is understood the Ayatollah fears he could be assassinated in the coming days.

Khamenei reportedly mostly speaks with his commanders through a trusted aide now, suspending electronic communications.

Khamenei has designated three senior religious figures as candidates to replace him as well as choosing successors in the military chain of command in the likely event that additional senior officials be eliminated.

Earlier on Saturday Israel confirmed the elimination of Saeed Izadi and Bhanam Shahriari.

Shahriari, head of Iran’s Quds Force Weapons Transfer Unit, responsible for arming Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, was killed in an Israeli airstrike over 1,000 km from Israel in western Iran.

The post Report: Wary of Assassination by Israel, Khamenei Names 3 Potential Successors first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Continue Reading

Copyright © 2017 - 2023 Jewish Post & News