Two young Syrians get arrested by IDF

(MENAFN) Israeli troops briefly held two young Syrian men on Friday after setting up a temporary checkpoint in Syria’s southwestern Quneitra province amid a wider military incursion into the area.

According to reports, the detentions occurred when the two men were stopped at a checkpoint positioned on the road linking the town of Umm Batna with the village of Al-Ajraf in the rural parts of Quneitra. They were later freed, with no additional information provided regarding the circumstances of their release.

Earlier the same day, Israeli military units, using eight armored vehicles, advanced into the Quneitra countryside. The convoy reportedly moved from the Adnaniyah area toward the villages of Umm Al-Azam and Ruwaihina, passing through Rasm Al-Halabi, Al-Mushairfa, and Umm Batna along the way.

The ground operation followed sightings of Israeli warplanes flying at low altitude over Quneitra, coinciding with the entry of Israeli forces into multiple villages across the province, according to reports.

Official Syrian data indicates that since December 2024, Israel has conducted more than 1,000 airstrikes inside Syria, in addition to over 400 cross-border incursions targeting southern regions.

Following the collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s government in late 2024, Israel widened its control over the Syrian Golan Heights by taking over the demilitarized buffer zone, a step seen as a violation of the 1974 disengagement agreement between the two sides.

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