Israel’s military marched into the demilitarized zone along the occupied Golan Heights for the first time in 50 years and seized Syrian territory after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s government.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday he had ordered his ground forces to take control of the buffer zone established by a 1974 ceasefire agreement with Syria after armed rebel groups pushed out Mr Assad from Damascus and took power.
Mr Netanyahu claimed the ceasefire agreement had collapsed as Syrian soldiers allegedly abandoned their positions, necessitating the Israeli takeover.
“We will not allow any hostile force to establish itself on our border,” the prime minister said as Mr Assad's fall added another layer of complexity to the Middle East crisis, which geopolitical analysts said was at the brink of regional war.
The Israeli military issued an "urgent warning" to residents of five communities in southern Syria to stay home shortly after Mr Netanyahu’s statement.
“The fighting in your area is forcing the IDF to act and we do not intend to harm you,” a military spokesperson, Colonel Avichay Adraee said, referring to the Israeli forces.
Israeli warplanes, meanwhile, continued to strike weapons and intelligence facilities inside Syria. At least three airstrikes hit a security complex in the Kafr Sousa area of Damascus and a research centre where Israel had previously said Iranian scientists developed missiles.
“We attacked ammunition depots in southern Syria and in the Damascus airport area for fear they might fall into the hands of armed groups and local factions,” an unnamed Israeli security official was quoted as saying by Israeli public broadcaster KAN.
He claimed that Israel was working to "thwart any potential threats and prevent any damage to its air superiority in Syria”. The Israeli military added that it was "not interfering with the internal events in Syria".
Israel captured the Golan Heights in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed it. The international community, except for the US, recognises it as occupied Syrian territory.
Syria’s takeover by insurgent groups spearheaded by Hayat al-Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, a rebranded al-Qaeda affiliate, marked one of the most significant geopolitical events in the Mideast for generations as Assad's downfall took away a bastion from which Iran and Russia exercised influence across the Arab world.
The HTS is designated as a terrorist group by the US, Turkey and the UN, although it has spent years seeking to soften its extremist image to reassure western governments as well as minority groups within Syria.
Assad fled to Russia, where he was provided asylum.
"A new history, my brothers, is being written in the entire region after this great victory," said Ahmed al-Sharaa, better known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani, the head of HTS.
Speaking to a massive gathering on Sunday at the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, a place of considerable religious significance, Golani, a former lieutenant to slain Isis chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, said with hard work Syria would be "a beacon for the Islamic nation”.
American president Joe Biden said that Syria was in a period of risk and uncertainty and it was the first time in years that Russia, Iran or Hezbollah did not have an influential role in the country.
Assad's overthrow reportedly limits Iran's ability to send weapons to its allies and could cost Russia its Mediterranean naval base at Tartus. It could also allow millions of refugees scattered for more than a decade in camps across Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan to return home.
