Israel welcomed this Sunday, with the end of the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad, the fall of a “central link” of the “axis of evil” led by Iran, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu seeing this as “a direct consequence” of the blows delivered by his country to Tehran and to Lebanese Hezbollah.
“This is a historic day in the history of the Middle East,” Netanyahu said from the Syrian Golan occupied and annexed by Israel.
It is ” a direct consequence of the blows we dealt to Iran and Hezbollah, the main supporters of the Assad regime » and who have “ sparked a chain reaction across the Middle East among those who wish to free themselves from this regime of oppression and tyranny ” Netanyahu said.
Fall of Assad: Lebanon and Israel strengthen their borders with Syria
“Very important new opportunities for the State of Israel”
Israel says it wants to put Hezbollah and Palestinian Hamas, allies of Iran, its enemy, out of harm's way. In recent months, Israel has killed several commanders of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, as well as senior Hamas and Hezbollah officials.
The dazzling offensive launched on November 27 by a rebel coalition in Syria coincided with the entry into force of a ceasefire in Lebanon between Israel and Hezbollah after two months of open war.
Israel had already congratulated itself on having eliminated the leader of the Lebanese Islamist movement at the end of September, the “pivot of the axis, the central engine of the Iranian axis of evil”, in the words of the Prime Minister.
The fall of Assad opens up very important new opportunities for the State of Israel », Said his Prime Minister on Sunday.
“At the same time, we are pursuing a policy of good neighborliness, the same policy we pursued by establishing a field hospital here that has treated thousands of Syrians injured and affected by the civil war,” Netanyahu added.
Israel, which claims to be engaged in a regional fight against Tehran, has frequently struck Hezbollah and Iranian targets in Syria, a country through which weapons destined for Hezbollah have transited, throughout the conflict, although it has rarely commented on these operations.
(with agencies)
