In late 2024, the 13-year-old war in Syria took a surprising turn. Faced with limited rebel action, the regime of Bashar al-Assad collapsed.

Amid the unrest, Israel has expanded its occupation of southern Syrian lands, driving hundreds of Syrians from their homes. It also launched a devastating aerial bombardment that destroyed the Syrian air force and military capabilities. Some bombings were so powerful that they were recorded as small earthquakes. The attacks have killed dozens of people.

Israeli soldiers also repeatedly fired at civilians protesting the occupation. The men come from communities that have long resisted Israel’s so-called nemesis, the Assad regime and Iran. These developments further prove that Israel’s claims to only strike against the “axis of resistance” and seek friendship with the people of the region are completely hollow.

Israel has clearly chosen to use war to establish relations with the new governments of its neighbors. It has positioned itself as the biggest disruptor of efforts to stabilize Syria and establish legitimate democratic governance.

It is important to remember that Israel is very happy with the Assad regime, a key member of the “Axis of Resistance”. For decades, Syrian President Hafez Assad ensured that Israel’s northern border remained quiet. After signing the “separation of forces” agreement in 1974, his regime stopped trying to regain the Golan Heights. Due to Assad’s failed policies as defense minister, Syria lost the Golan Heights to Israel during the 1967 war.

Under the leadership of Hafez’s son Bashar, the status quo has not changed. As a country that maintains de facto peace with Israel without a treaty, Syria brings significant benefits to both the United States and Israel—in some ways, even more than a full normalization of relations with the Zionist entity of Arab countries.

For example, the Assad regime’s ties to the “Axis of Resistance” put it in a special position to share intelligence and barter with wanted individuals and groups in exchange for its own survival. Israel sees it as a rare prize that allows it to violate Syria’s sovereignty at will and distract from its own crimes, given the scale of the violence the regime is committing against the Syrian people.

When the Syrian revolution broke out in 2011, it was bad news for Bashar Assad and Israel. The Israeli government has made clear to its Western allies that it does not want the regime to fall.

In 2013, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government helped U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration walk back a threat to strike Assad’s regime over its use of chemical weapons in Ghouta, outside Damascus. It proposed that the United States and Russia reach an agreement to dismantle Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal, but Washington later used this as an excuse not to fulfill its “red line” commitments.

Israel welcomed Russia’s 2015 intervention to help Bashar Assad stay in power and even provided Russian forces with drones for use against Syrian opposition forces. In 2018, as part of a deal Israel negotiated with Russia, it “approved” the regime’s takeover of rebel-held territory in southern Syria.

Netanyahu declared at the time: “We have no problems with the Assad regime. In 40 years, not a single bullet has been fired in the Golan Heights.”

When Israel launched its latest incursion into Syrian territory in September, two months before Bashar al-Assad was toppled, no shots were fired. The Syrian president responded by ignoring the expansion of the Israeli occupation and publicly claiming that it never happened.

Between September and December, Israel added 500 square kilometers (192 square miles) of Syrian land to the Syrian territory it had occupied since 1967. The area includes the entire demilitarized zone of the 1974 “separation of forces” agreement and areas beyond it. Israeli media claim that Israeli forces control 95% of Quneitra Province. Israeli forces have driven dozens of Syrians from villages and towns and moved deeper into the city of Quneitra and the Ba’athist town. Syrians in the south were unable to celebrate the fall of the regime they had long hoped for.

Analysts offer different views on the reasons for Israel’s invasion of new Syrian territories. Some see “strategic” and “military” advantages in having the position so close to Damascus. Others see it as a conquest aimed at exchange for Syrian recognition of Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights. Others pointed to the “religious right” and declared that “Jerusalem’s future will extend to Damascus.” Regardless of how Israeli policymakers view the invasion, it fits a historical pattern: Israel has been expansionist since its founding, both under secular and left-wing governments.

In addition to the intrinsic value of the newly “conquered” lands, the expansion of the occupation is also designed to create new sources of instability for Syria’s new government. This serves two purposes. Ideally, it would serve as a pressure point for the new authorities to weaken unity between Syria and the Palestinian cause. But even if it fails, it will become an ongoing source of instability, tension and stress within Syrian politics, potentially altering the trajectory of democracy in post-Assad Syria. Foreign occupation of territory often has this effect on domestic politics, including in the Middle East, where Israeli aggression and occupation have largely justified authoritarian rule.

Once Israel’s defenses are entrenched, they will be difficult to undo — and will affect Damascus’s entire new political experiment. There is an urgent need to confront it, especially since Israel is trying to exploit the distraction in Syria.

However, the approach of the new authorities is to try to eliminate all excuses for Israeli aggression and to rely on the international community to contain Israeli aggression. Syria’s new de facto leader, Ahmed Shala, made this approach clear and left nothing to hide: while declaring that Israel had “crossed the line of engagement,” he also noted that Syria No military capability Confronting the Israeli military at this point will not allow either side to use Syrian territory to drag it into such a war.

The new Syrian authorities are undoubtedly walking a tightrope. On the one hand, they face a serious threat of state collapse, and on the other hand, they face popular pressure to stabilize their economies and deliver services, an objective that could be greatly facilitated by the lifting of sanctions by Western powers allied with Israel.

Despite early “reassuring” sounds from the new administration, the likelihood that Israel will pressure Syria to embark on a path to “normalization” is slim. An isolationist minority may rise to demand improved relations with Israel and an end to Syria’s historic support for the Palestinian cause, but ironically, with each new Israeli strike, the chances of this happening diminish. will decrease.

There is little support for normalization not only among ordinary people but also among the rebels who will form the backbone of the new military and state security apparatus. Hayat Tahrir (HTS), the de facto new regime in Damascus, has historically opposed such contacts with Israel, and Syrian rebel fighters and commanders also include a large number of Palestinians. Pushing in this direction could spark internal rebellion.

Israel has made it clear that it will not wait to see what happens with Syria’s new government. Israel’s approach has always been preemptive aggression, almost regardless of who the opponent is.

When it comes to Syria, however, Israel knows that it has remained strong for decades despite attempts to undermine unity between Syrians and Palestinians. Since the outbreak of the Syrian revolution, both Syrians and Palestinians, especially in Gaza, have held demonstrations in solidarity with each other.

Israel also knows that the Free Syria cause enjoys tremendous moral legitimacy and strength among Syrians and Arabs in general. It will therefore seek to prevent the new Syrian government from maintaining stability at home and gaining legitimacy abroad through continued military maneuvers and diplomatic sabotage.

Israel’s expanding aggression requires a united front, including at the activist level. All those who bemoan the fall of Bashar al-Assad and gloat about Israel’s bombing of Syria should do some serious reflection on why Israel is attacking now. Clearly, a cohesive, democratic Syria would be a stronger supporter of Palestinian liberation than Assad’s tyranny.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Al Jazeera.