Hezbollah syria

The UN human rights office cited reports that at least 82 people had been killed on the streets while fleeing or in their homes in four different neighborhoods in the last few days.

Still, Assad's forces are overextended, raising questions about how much territory it can hold at one time, as it relies on manpower from Hezbollah and Shi’ite militias.

Among the most horrifying aspects of the five-year-old Syrian civil war was Assad’s use of chemical weapons, including the massive August 2013 sarin gas attack that killed more than 1,400 civilians.

Defense Minister said that Israel acts to prevent transfer of WMDs from Syria. As far as is known, it is the first time that a senior Israeli official expressed such a concern.

When it comes to areas more distant from the border – certainly near Damascus – the operation is much more complicated, risky and could spin out of control.

Since the beginning of the civil war in Syria, and as the battles have encroached on the Israeli border, the period of utter calm along the Syrian-Israeli border, which has persisted for 40 years.

The IDF has neither confirmed nor denied the strikes.

Locked out of the government system for several hours, Syrian officials turned to Facebook to deny any attack against Assad and update viewers on his current condition.

As the preliminary maneuvering begins to take Islamic State’s capital, Raqqa, the forces that seek to take control of the city are also at war with each other.

Israel has long seen Iran as its greatest threat and campaigned hard against US-led efforts to strike a nuclear deal with Tehran.