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A senior Israeli official accused Iran of attempting to open a second war front by deploying in or throughout Syria.
Joshua Zarka, head of strategic affairs for Israel's Foreign ministry, responded to a post shared by American Center for Levant Studies founder/director Joel Rayburn, who previously served as the U.S. special envoy for Syria, in which Rayburn claimed "the Iranian regime is trying to move strategic weapons to or via Syria to open a northern front" and noted that "the Israelis are determined to preempt that."
"1. They are. 2. We are," Zarka wrote on his X account while re-sharing Rayburn's initial post.
The interaction comes days after Syria accused Israel of air strikes against Damascus and Aleppo airports last week and speculation of Syria entering the ongoing Gaza conflict in retaliation. At least 1,300 people, including at least 25 American citizens, were killed in the initial terror attacks on Israel by Hamas on October 7, CNN reports.
A reported 2,450 people have died and 9,200 were injured in retaliation attacks on Gaza as of Sunday (October 15), the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza said via CNN. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared, "we are in a war," in a video shared on social media after the attacks, which included land, air and sea as Hamas fighters infiltrated Israel's southern border and fired rockets from the Gaza Strip. Netanyahu ordered an "extensive reserve mobilization" in retaliation for the unprecedented attacks.
Last Wednesday (October 11), the Gaza Ministry of Energy announced that the Gaza Strip's sole power plant has run out of fuel amid an Israeli blockade. The energy ministry said it was forced to shut down after supplies were cut off, leaving only generators to power the territory, while hundreds of thousands are displaced.