On Thursday, Israel carried out at least two airstrikes on strategic locations in Syria’s capital, Damascus, and its outskirts, killing at least 15 people and injuring 16 others, according to reports from Syria’s state news agency SANA. The attacks hit the Mazzeh neighborhood in central Damascus and the Qudsaya suburb northwest of the city. One missile hit a five-story building in Mazzeh, damaging the structure, while SANA said targets in Qudsaya included a building that collapsed.

The Israeli military confirmed that the strikes had targeted infrastructure and command centers associated with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a militant group backed by Iran. The airstrikes are part of Israel’s ongoing efforts to dismantle operations run by the PIJ in Syria and across the region that the Israeli government has connected to the deadly October 7 attacks led by Hamas in southern Israel last year.

Context of the Attacks: Regional Fallout from Gaza Conflict

The airstrikes come after attacks on Israel on October 7 by Hamas and the PIJ, which killed more than 1,200 people and took hundreds of hostages. In response to those attacks, Israel launched widespread military operations in Gaza. It stepped up assaults on PIJ and other Iran-backed forces across the region of Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq.

Israeli officials further claimed they would continue targeting these groups wherever they operate. “We will continue to operate against the Islamic Jihad terrorist organization wherever necessary,” a military spokesperson said.

The strikes also come at a sensitive time, as Iranian official Ali Larijani is visiting Damascus for a meeting with Palestinian factions. It seems the timing of the strikes directly challenged Iran’s growing influence in Syria because Tehran has been a principal supporter of President Bashar al-Assad’s regime since the Syrian civil war broke out in 2011. 

Read Also:Israeli Airstrikes in Damascus Leave 15 Dead: Targeted Military Sites and Islamic Jihad Headquarters

 Impact on Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah

According to a PIJ official, one of the raids struck their office in Damascus, killing several members of the group. But Israel’s military campaign against the PIJ is not limited to Syria. The Israeli air force has also pounded Hezbollah positions in Lebanon, another Iran-backed militia involved in the broader regional conflict.

On the same day of strikes in Syria, Israeli warplanes conducted airstrikes in Lebanon, including a lethal attack on Baalbek that killed at least nine people. The airstrikes in Lebanon are part of Israel’s response to Hezbollah’s continuous cross-border rocket fire into Israeli territory in support of Hamas. More than 3,200 have been reported dead and over 14,000 injured since the outbreak of hostilities in October, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry.

UN Forces in Lebanon: Creeping Tension of the War

The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon is keeping an eye on the border between Lebanon and Israel as risks have risen. Recently, an exchange between the two has left some 13 personnel of UN peacekeepers injured. UN peacekeeping chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix visited Lebanon this week and clarified why UNIFIL must be maintained in the south of Lebanon.

Lacroix noted that even while the fighting remains a continuous process, the UN continues to strive for the implementation of Security Council Resolution 1701, which was a call to end the 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel. So far, full implementation has never been achieved, and the tensions along the disputed border called the Blue Line between the two countries continue to be heightened.

Humanitarian Crisis Escalation

The humanitarian toll continues to mount while the violence spreads across the region. In Gaza, most of which has been destroyed by Israeli airstrikes, more than 43,000 Palestinians—almost all of them women and children—have been killed. Nearly 1.2 million people were displaced inside Lebanon by the continued Israeli airstrikes, compounding the already desperate situation there.

Now, as tensions flare, the international community continues to call for hostilities to stop, but it is still unclear whether the conflict will be resolved through peace. This war has deep-reaching implications that go very far beyond the Middle East as Israel’s military campaign threatens to blow out of Gaza, enter Syria, and spill over into Lebanon.

Conclusion: A Region on the Brink

The violence in Syria, Lebanon, and Gaza finds its roots in more significant regional conflicts about chronic political and religious disputes. The fact that Israel has intensified airstrikes on Syrian and Lebanese territory should have left no doubt that the blowback of the Gaza conflict is in motion. As the conflict continues, world powers are pinning their nerves, suspecting that the region is still at risk of instability.