Attacks on Israel and Turkey are increasingly attacking Syria

2017 becomes a year of success for the Syrian regime that has regained most of its territory with the help of Russia. After the defeated and disintegrating opposition groups, this war seems to have come to an end with victory in the hands of government troops. Freelance journalist Paul Iddon living in Erbil, Iraq, writes his analysis on the current Middle East situation on the Alaraby page.

According to him, two neighboring countries, Israel and Turkey, have concerns about what will happen after the conflict is over. For Israel, Iran's growing influence in Syria is dangerous as the Syrian Kurds are increasingly dangerous for Turkey.

Both Israel and Turkey launched an offensive into Syria this month and could cause the conflict in Syria to drag on.

Israel

Star Land of David began air strikes and missiles from the ground on Jan. 9 to target what they claim to be ammunition or weapons of alleged long-range missile storage in Qutayfeh, northeast of Damascus. The second attack on January 16, according to Israeli media, reportedly hit Hezbollah arsenal in the Mezzeh region of the military air base, southwest of Damascus.

Israel has actually launched air strikes several times to Syria since 2013. They target sophisticated anti-air missiles and anti-skirmish missile missiles so that Hezbollah does not have any weapons suspected to be from Iran. Israel is worried if Hezbollah has sophisticated weapons that could be used to strike them in the future.

What needs to be noted is that these attacks occurred when Damascus was recapturing its territory previously held by opposition or rebel and ISIS. President Basyar al-Assad stayed to capture some more areas such as Idlib, East Ghouta, to regain control of much of Syria. If he has succeeded then his troops could be more focused to confront and counter Israel's attacks.

Turkey

Turkey also deployed its ground and air forces in Syria to wipe out the Kurdish militia forces known as YPG who controlled two-thirds of the Syrian-Turkish border after they defeated ISIS.

Turkey controlled a third of the border area between Jazira and Kobane.

The US military and YPG and Syrian Liberation forces (SDF) previously coalesced to combat ISIS in Syria. Turkey is unhappy with this US action. Moreover, last week the United States announced it would form a 30,000-member border force that was partly Kurdish militia. The move, according to Turkey, could threaten security because Kurds have long been viewed as a separatist group.

Since last Saturday the Turkish army pounded the town of Afrin, in northeastern Syria, which is a Kurdish enclave in Syria.!