From the Liveblog of
Sunday, November 3, 2024
IDF says commandos captured man in Syria gathering intel on border for Iran
Emanuel (Mannie) Fabian is The Times of Israel's military correspondent
Israeli commandos recently carried out a raid in southern Syria where they captured a Syrian man who was allegedly carrying surveillance operations on the border on behalf of Iran, the IDF reveals.
According to the IDF, the raid in Syria was carried out in recent months by the Egoz commando unit, along with field interrogators of the Intelligence Directorate’s Unit 504.
The commandos captured Ali Suleiman al-Asi, a Syrian man who lived in the village of Saida, in the Daraa Governorate.
The IDF says that the man worked on behalf of Iran, and was involved in collecting intelligence on the Israeli military’s operations along the Syrian border, “for future terror activity.”
The military was “closely monitoring” al-Asi before he was captured and taken to Israel for questioning.
His arrest has “prevented and disrupted a future attack and led to the exposure of the modus operandi of Iranian entities on the Golan Heights front,” the IDF says.
The IDF releases footage from al-Asi’s interrogation, where he says that he was approached by a man who told him: “Your area is good, strategic, we can get something from this.” Al-Asi says that the man was “linked to Iran.”
The detained Syrian man tells Israeli interrogators that he was instructed by the Iranian-linked man to “just observe the borders,” while under the guise of Syria’s military intelligence, and pass on information on Israeli patrols.
The Times of Israel Community.