Israeli forces enter southern Syria’s Quneitra

The Israeli troops, backed by two tanks and four military vehicles, have entered the Quneitra countryside in southern Syria, according to Syria’s state news agency Sana.

The military set up a checkpoint on the road to Ain al-Bayda in northern Quneitra, the report said.

A disengagement agreement in 1974 between Israel and Syria created a UN buffer zone in Syria’s Golan Heights, an area that has been occupied by Israel since 1967. 

When Bashar al-Assad’s government fell in December, Israel occupied the buffer zone and declared that the 1974 agreement was null and void.