Starting a new front? Sources: Israel may “encircle” Hezbollah from the east!

According to security sources and analysts, the Israeli military has cleared mines and built new barriers in the demilitarized zone bordering Syria in the occupied Golan Heights, which indicates that Israel may expand its ground operations against Hezbollah while strengthening its own defenses.

Sources said the move indicates that Israel may launch an attack on Hezbollah from further east of the Lebanese border for the first time, while also creating a secure area so that the armed group can be freely detected and infiltrated.

Sources — including a Syrian soldier based in southern Syria, a Lebanese security official, and a UN peacekeeper — revealed more unreported details, indicating that Israel is moving the fence separating the demilitarized zone to the Syrian side and excavating more fortifications in the area.

Potential military action could widen the conflict between Israel, Hezbollah, and Hamas. This conflict has already brought Iran in, and is likely to bring in the US.

Since Hezbollah launched rockets in support of Hamas, Israel has been fighting with Hezbollah, which is supported by Tehran. Now, in addition to the Israeli air raids that have caused significant damage over the past month, Hezbollah is facing Israeli ground attacks from the south and Israeli naval shelling from the western Mediterranean.

By extending its front line eastward, Israel is likely to increase pressure on Hezbollah's arms supply routes, some of which cross Syria. Navvar Saban (Navvar Saban), a conflict analyst at the Harmon Center, said the operation in the Golan Heights appeared to be an attempt to “prepare” for a larger attack in Lebanon.

He said, “Everything that happened in Syria was meant to serve Israel's strategy in Lebanon — attacking supply lines, attacking warehouses, and attacking personnel linked to Hezbollah's supply lines.”

According to a Syrian intelligence official, a Syrian soldier based in southern Syria, and three senior Lebanese security sources, Israel's mine clearance and engineering operations have accelerated in the past few weeks.

According to the soldier and a regional intelligence source, Israeli tanks sometimes briefly enter Syrian territory east of the United Nations-monitored buffer zone to ensure the bulldozer's job of setting up a new, apparently security fence.

Sources said that as Israel launched a ground attack on Hezbollah on October 1 in the mountainous area separating northern Israel and southern Lebanon about 20 kilometers, demining activities have also intensified. During the same period, Israel intensified its attacks on Syria, including its capital and border with Lebanon.

All sources requested anonymity to discuss their monitoring of Israeli military operations in the Golan Heights. Most of the Golan Heights was taken by Israel from Syria in 1967.

A Syrian soldier stationed in the south said Israel is pushing the fence separating the Golan Heights and the demilitarized zone outward and building its own fortifications close to Syria “to prevent infiltration when clashes break out on this front line.”

The soldier said Israel appeared to have created a “buffer zone” within the demilitarized zone. Another senior Lebanese security source said that the Israeli army dug a new trench near the demilitarized zone in October.

A senior Lebanese security source said that the demining operation could allow the Israeli military to “encircle” Hezbollah from the east.

For the past 50 years, the demilitarized zone has been home to the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF), which is tasked with overseeing the disengagement of Israeli and Syrian forces after the 1973 war. “Disengagement” means that the two armies no longer face each other directly, but instead have a neutral buffer zone to reduce the possibility of conflict.

A New York-based UN peacekeeper said UNDOF “recently observed some construction activity carried out by the Israeli military in the area of separation,” but did not provide further details.