Tomb of Assad’s father set on fire in Syria hometown: AFP
The tomb of ousted Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s father Hafez was torched in his home town of Qardaha, accoding to AFP footage taken on Wednesday. AFP said it showed rebel fighters in fatigues and young men watching it burn.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor told AFP the rebels had set fire to the mausoleum, located in the Latakia heartland of Assad’s Alawite community. AFP footage showed parts of the mausoleum ablaze and damaged.
Key events
France urges Israel to withdraw forces from Syria buffer zone
Israel must withdraw forces from the buffer zone separating the annexed Golan Heights from Syrian territory, France’s foreign ministry said on Wednesday, according to AFP.
“Any military deployment in the separation zone between Israel and Syria is a violation of the disengagement agreement of 1974,” a foreign ministry spokesperson said.
Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, announced on Sunday he had ordered the army to “seize” the demilitarised zone in the Syrian-controlled part of the Golan Heights after rebels swept Syrian president Bashar al-Assad from power.
“France calls on Israel to withdraw from the zone and to respect Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” the foreign ministry spokesperson said, reports AFP.
The area is patrolled by a UN peacekeeping force known as UNDOF, with the global body warning Israel on Monday that it is in breach of the 50-year-old deal that ended a 1973 war with Syria.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, a UN official in New York told AFP that Israeli forces had occupied seven positions in the buffer zone.
France’s intervention follows condemnations from Saudi Arabia, Iran, Russia and Turkey, as well as a US call for the Israeli incursion to be “temporary”.
Reuters is now carrying fuller quotes from UN secretary-general António Guterres, who commented on the situation in Syria while on a visit to South Africe. He said:
As we speak, we are witnessing the reshaping of the Middle East. We also see some signs of hope, and signs of hope namely coming from the end of the Syrian dictatorship.
It’s our duty to do everything to support different Syrian leaders in order to make sure that they come together, they are able to guarantee a smooth transition, an inclusive transition in which all Syrians can feel that they belong. The alternative doesn’t make any sense.
Here are some of the latest images sent to us from the region.
The National News Agency in Lebanon reports that one person has been killed by a “raid carried out by an Israeli enemy drone targeting a van with a guided missile on the road between the towns of Beit Lif and Sarbin” in the Bint Jbeil district of southern Lebanon.
Ireland has added itself to the list of European countries to suspend the processing of asylum applications by refugees from Syria.
The Irish minister for justice told Reuters on Wednesday that the international protection office would temporarily pause the issuing of final determinations while the situation in Syria was kept under review.
Austria, Belgium, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK have all announced similar moves.
UN secretary-general António Guterres said on Wednesday during a visit to South Africa that there were some signs of hope from the end of the Syrian dictatorship, Reuters reports.
It quotes him saying “I fully trust Syrian people to be able to choose their own destiny.”
Germany’s foreign minister on Wednesday urged Israel and Turkey not to jeopardise a peaceful transition in Syria after the ousting of president Bashar al-Assad.
“We must not allow the internal Syrian dialogue process to be torpedoed from the outside,” Annalena Baerbock told a Berlin press conference, reports AFP.
Baerbock said:
Neighbours such as the Turkish and Israeli governments, which are asserting their security interests, must not jeopardise the process.”
Since Assad’s downfall, Israel has launched strikes on military sites in Syria ranging from weapons depots to naval vessels, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor. Israel has also sent troops into a UN-patrolled buffer zone east of the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights.
Turkey meanwhile is worried Kurdish separatists could take advantage of Assad’s ouster to extend their influence in Syria, where they have dominated a large north-eastern area since 2012.
Ankara sees the Kurdish forces, notably the militant group YPG, as an extension of the banned Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK), which has fought a bloody insurgency against the Turkish state since the 1980s.
Since Assad fled, Turkish-backed groups have launched offensives in northern Syria.
According to AFP, the Kurdish-led force in the north-east of the country said on Wednesday it had reached a US-brokered ceasefire with the Turkish-backed fighters in Manbij, an Arab-majority city that has seen fierce clashes.
Baerbock said Syria’s “new chapter” was still being written, adding that “the outcome of the revolution is not certain, nor have the people won the transition to a free and peaceful Syria”.
“We must now seek to promote positive developments in Syria and prevent negative influences,” she said. “In very specific terms, this means that a Syrian-led dialogue process is needed, which we as Europeans and as Germans will support.”
“Syria must not be allowed to become a pawn in the hands of foreign powers or forces again,” she added.
Syria’s rebel leader says all involved in torturing detainees will not be pardoned
Syrian rebel leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, better known Abu Mohammed al-Golani, said on Wednesday that all who were involved in torturing and killing detainees in Syrian prisons would not be pardoned, reports Reuters.
“We will pursue them in Syria, and we ask countries to hand over those who fled so we can achieve justice,” Golani said in a statement published on the Syrian state TV’s Telegram channel.
Blinken heads to Jordan and Turkey for Syria talks
US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, will head to Jordan and Turkey on Wednesday for talks on Syria, the Department of State said, reports Reuters.
Blinken, who will visit Aqaba, Jordan and Ankara, Turkey through Friday, will also discuss regional developments including in Israel, Gaza and Lebanon, the department said in a statement.
National security adviser, Jake Sullivan, is also traveling to Israel on Wednesday, the White House said.
AFP have a little more detail on the story of the tomb of Bashar al-Assad’s father being set on fire in Syria (see 12.45pm GMT).
AFP reports that its footage showed the tomb of Hafez torched and destroyed.
The vast elevated structure atop a hill has an intricate architectural design with several arches, its exterior embellished with ornamentation etched in stone. It also houses the tombs of other Assad family members, including Bashar’s brother Bassel, who was killed in a road accident in 1994.
