Israel has targeted the remnants of Syria’s navy left by the collapsed military forces of ousted dictator Bashar al-Assad.
The Israeli ministry of defence has confirmed it sank at least 15 Syrian naval vessels in the ports of Al-Bayda and Latakia on 10 and 11 December. The measures were taken with an eye toward reducing the military assets available to the Islamist rebel forces that overthrew Assad on 7 December after a lightning advance on Damascus.
“If the new regime in Syria allows Iran to re-establish itself, or allows the transfer of weapons to Hezbollah – we will respond strongly and exact a heavy price from it,” Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on 10 December.
Former president Assad is believed to have fled the country on a widely-tracked Ilyushin Il-76 flight on 7 December that disappeared from flight tracking mid-air. He is now being sheltered in Russia – leaving a power vacuum in Syria.
Israel’s defence minister Israel Katz says his country’s forces are engaged in a broad effort to “destroy strategic capabilities that threaten the State of Israel”. He characterises the action against Syrian naval assets as a “great success”.
The defence ministry says it has also targeted airfields, anti-aircraft weapons, ammunition depots and arms production sites across Syria with the goal of preventing those assets from “falling into the hands of extremists”.
