Ongoing hostilities between Israeli forces and Iranian-backed militias in south Syria escalated markedly in recent weeks, with cross-border missile strikes from militants met with regular Israeli airstrikes and shelling, before tailing off somewhat at the beginning of January. Throughout December, Iranian-backed militias launched scores of attacks from nearly a dozen locations across rural areas of Daraa, Quneitra and southern Rural Damascus. Renewed attempts by Russia to project a veneer of power and control over the situation in the south-west have done little to halt these concurrent escalations. In the past two weeks, Moscow has again noticeably stepped-up flyovers and ground patrols. The Syrian regime, meanwhile, has continued to play a largely passive role in the unfolding conflict, mostly remaining on the sidelines of any direct military action.
Attached Map:
Recent Developments in South Syria
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Conflict with Israel
Iranian-backed groups repeatedly targeted the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights with missiles from northern Quneitra province, western Rural Damascus province as well as other remote locations in central and western Daraa. Altogether, dozens of rockets were launched, landing in areas across the Golan.
Israel has in turn launched numerous airstrikes, mortar attacks and bouts of gunfire into Syrian territory, targeting numerous sites across Daraa and Quneitra provinces. Together, these attacks inflicted several casualties among regime troops—a sign that Israel intends to punish the regime as long as cross-border hostilities continue and Damascus fails to rein-in Iranian-backed militias inside Syria.
Pro-Regime Activity
Amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Iranian-backed militias, Russian forces have continued to assert their presence through increasingly frequent military patrols across Daraa and Quneitra. Ground patrols took place along the Damascus-Daraa international highway towards the Nassib border crossing with Jordan, as well as in the eastern Daraa countryside and along Quneitra’s border strip with the occupied Golan.
Cross-Border Smuggling
December witnessed an unprecedented escalation in terms of regime-sanctioned cross-border smuggling activity. In mid-December, hundreds of smugglers and Hezbollah-affiliated fighters launched two coordinated border attacks on the Syrian-Jordanian border, prompting retaliatory airstrikes from Jordan. Smugglers were attempting to move narcotics (including Captagon and hashish) as well as heavy weaponry into Jordan.
Meanwhile, in eastern Daraa, groups affiliated with al-Awdeh also carried out raids in Busra al-Sham to seek out drug traffickers; al-Awdeh’s groups also conducted a series of raids and arrests targeting ISIS cell members in several locations across eastern Daraa and northern Daraa. Pro-regime forces carried out several anti-drug raids in areas of eastern Daraa, where they destroyed a farm that was purportedly used for smuggling, likely part of a series of performative counter-smuggling measures that attempt to obscure the regime’s systemic support for arms and drug smuggling networks in south Syria.
Instability in South Syria
A series of three IED blasts across Daraa province targeted Russian and regime forces, resulting in at least six deaths and four injuries. Additionally, two roadside bombs killed two civilians and injured five others, including children. At least one of the devices was believed to have been planted by Hezbollah. ISIS also claimed responsibility for a bomb blast that destroyed a regime building in western Daraa.
Targeted killings have continued and increased over the past month across south-west Syria. Assassinations claimed the lives of over 30 individuals, among them ISIS members, drug traffickers, civilians, 4th Division members, Military Intelligence officers, former HTS members and former opposition fighters. Additionally, dozens of other unsuccessful assassination attempts were recorded across the region.
Unchecked criminality and extortion are still being regularly reported from communities across Daraa and Quneitra provinces. Despite concerted efforts by an array of actors to curb endemic levels of kidnapping in south Syria, extortion networks have continued to regularly seize individuals and hold them for ransom. At least six high-profile abductions were recorded in Daraa province in December, with the groups responsible for the kidnappings demanding sums of up to $100,000 per release.
Humanitarian Developments
While public protests in south Syria have continued to diminish in size and frequency in recent months, two notable demonstrations took place in the city of Daraa in December. One protest, attended by more than 300 people, declared solidarity with Gaza and demanded the release of detainees from regime prisons; another protest two weeks later was attended by 100 people.
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