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Today on State of the World, Israel's attacks on Syria.
You're listening to State of the World from NPR. We bring you the day's most vital international stories up close where they're happening. I'm Greg Dixon. Almost immediately after Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad fell, the country came under attack from Israel. Israel has struck Syria hundreds of times since December.
The two countries share a border in Syria's southwest, and Israel has said the attacks are for its own security. They don't trust Syria's new government, and they want to disarm the country's south. NPR's Lauren Freyer takes us to one of the villages Israel hit.
Abdulrahman Hamdan walks through his family's olive grove, recounting how his uncle called him from here in a panic last month. Israeli troops had crossed into Syria when Assad fell. At the time, Syria's new government was just forming. It didn't have the means to counter Israel and said it wanted cordial relations.
But Israeli troops were now moving deeper into Syria. They were bombing infrastructure and seizing land in Hamdan's village. His uncle told him he and his neighbors were rushing out with hunting rifles after Israeli troops killed two farmers. The villagers fired first at Israeli troops on their property. The response, he says, was disproportionate. Israeli helicopters.
drones, artillery. Hamdan shows me the call log on his phone. 9.15. In the morning. He died 9.30. He was killed 9.30. His uncle was one of seven people killed by Israeli troops who entered their village that day. The Israeli military called them terrorists. People like Aza Mohammed, a mother of six,
who lost her leg to an Israeli artillery strike. She lays on a bed, bandaged and helpless, in the house of her father, Hani Mohammed, who says some in Syria are downplaying these attacks out of fear. Some of the older folks used to go to school just west of here, in the Golan Heights, before Israel seized that territory in 1967 and still occupies it today. Ah!
Israel used to attack Iranian weapons being funneled through Syria to Hezbollah in neighboring Lebanon. But those routes were cut off with Assad's ouster. Since then, Syria has arrested Hezbollah militants, and zero attacks on Israel have originated here. But Israel has launched several hundred air and artillery strikes like these, saying it wants to prevent the formation of any threat.
A farmer named Mossabel Abdullah zips up on his motorbike out of breath. He's just run from Israeli soldiers. He says this is the second time they've come onto his farm in jeeps. Last month, he was harvesting zucchini when they took him and seven other farmers at gunpoint, he says, into Israel for questioning. They dropped him back off with a warning to stay off their own land.
The Israeli military confirmed his account, calling his farm a closed military zone now. One possible recourse for Abdullah is United Nations peacekeepers stationed nearby. They're part of the UN Disengagement Observer Force, or UNDOF, tasked with maintaining an Israel-Syria ceasefire that goes back to the 1973 Yom Kippur War.
Okay, we're at the door of this UN base. No entry, authorized personnel only. A UN peacekeeper answers the big blue metal door topped with barbed wire. She asks me to stop recording. And speaks to Abdullah through a grate. But it's difficult. She doesn't speak Arabic. She doesn't ask for his name. She says she'll make a report. He offers his phone number, but he never got a call back the last time he did this either.
NPR asked the UN for an update on his case. It replied that it continues to engage with the Israeli military about what it calls its violations in this area. As Abdullah walks away, he says he feels really let down. He's scared to go back to his farm. But if he can't harvest his land, he'll go hungry, he says.
A day later, dozens of Israeli military vehicles entered Syria again near here. And the sky over these olive groves lit up with explosions. Israel confirmed launching a ground and air attack. Afterwards, Syria's new government found its voice. It called these attacks a, quote, clear Israeli attempt to normalize violence, undermining Syria's efforts to rebuild after 14 years of civil war.
Lauren Frayer, NPR News in Daraa, southern Syria. That's the state of the world from NPR. Thanks for listening.
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