Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan warned Syria and its backer Russia on Thursday that Israel could attack Damascus' forces if they try to deploy in a demilitarized border zone while advancing against rebels in the region.
Syrian President Bashar Assad launched an offensive last month to regain southern Daraa and is expected to aim next for rebel-held Quneitra, abutting the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
The fighting has displaced more than 320,000 people, according to the United Nations. Many of them have sought shelter at the Jordanian border or the Golan lines with Israel, generating pressure on both countries to provide relief.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is set to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow next Wednesday, called twice this week for the preservation of a U.N.-monitored 1974 Israel-Syria Separation Agreement barring or limiting military buildups by either side around the Golan.
"We must verify and do everything to clarify, vis-à-vis the Russians, [to] the Assad government that we will not accept any armed presence by the Assad regime in the areas which are meant to be demilitarized," Erdan, who is also a member of the security cabinet, told the Ynet news website.
Asked if Israel was prepared to take preventive action against the Syrian military, Erdan said, "Unequivocally, yes."
He cited recent air strikes against Syrian facilities deemed to have been used in attacks on Israel or by Assad's Iranian reinforcements.
"Here, too, if there is a violation, and certainly in the southern Syrian region which is close to the citizens of the State of Israel, and a bringing of weaponry that should not be there, Israel will take action," Erdan said.
A March report on the activities of the U.N. Disengagement and Observer Force on the Golan said Syria's military maintained positions that violated the 1974 accord, as did Israel's deployment of 155 mm artillery, Iron Dome air defense systems and related equipment.
"Our demand is that the Iranian forces will go out or withdraw from Syria as a whole, and specifically southwest Syria," a senior Israeli military official.
The Israeli military official, speaking on condition of anonymity under briefing guidelines, said that while there is no love lost for Assad, the Israeli thinking recognizes the emerging reality.
"We are looking for an address, a reliable one. We are looking for security and defense for our territory, interests and people," he said. "If we get that, of course, it's fine with us.
Stephane Cohen, a former Israeli liaison officer to U.N. observers in the Golan, said Syria is expected to honor the 1974 agreement, as it did in the past. "The problem is what that comes with now, which is Iran and Hezbollah and other Shiite proxies. That's the issue," he said.
One complicating factor is that the U.N. peacekeepers abandoned their positions during the fighting and would need to return to monitor the truce.
A key player could be Russia, which also sent forces into Syria to back Assad. Netanyahu will travel to Russia next week to meet with President Vladimir Putin, for what is expected to be the latest in a series of discussions about Syria.
Israel on Sunday sent more artillery and tanks to the Golan in what it said was a precaution in light of the Daraa fighting.
The Netanyahu government refuses to provide asylum for refugees from Syria, an enemy country. But with hundreds of new refugees from Daraa turning up on the Golan daily, Israel's military and civilians have stepped up humanitarian relief work on the Golan.
Israel has also quietly been in contact with a number of international organizations, including the U.N. Disengagement Observer Force, in an effort to establish a mechanism to allow it to continue to provide humanitarian aid to the residents of the Syrian Golan after Assad's forces retake control of the area.
A number of rebel groups have been positioned in southern Syria since the 2011 outbreak of the civil war, and as a result, a majority of residents there have been cut off from the central government in Damascus, meaning they have been without access to electricity and running water for some time. With education systems and health services in the south partially operational, if at all, locals must rely on humanitarian aid for their survival. Much of this aid, whether donated by Israelis or international organizations, is delivered by Israel as part of its "Operation Good Neighbor" program to assist Syrians affected by the war. Israel has treated thousands of sick and wounded Syrians, mainly children, in hospitals across the country and provided basic medical services in a special clinic set up on the border between the two countries as part of the program.
The hope in Jerusalem is that by continuing to provide assistance, Syrian locals will remain sympathetic to Israel and as a result, be less likely to support Iran in its efforts to establish itself militarily in territory abandoned by opposition fighters. But the move would require Damascus' approval, which it has yet to give. To this end, Israeli officials are now engaged in efforts to promote the plan to officials in both Moscow and Washington.
Meanwhile, the U.N. Security Council failed to agree on any response to the escalating fighting and deteriorating situation in Daraa, one of Syria's last major rebel strongholds near Jordan and the Israeli Golan Heights, during emergency closed-door consultations. Opposition activists say scores of civilians have been killed in the escalation there.
Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia, whose country is taking part in air strikes against rebel-held areas in the southwest, told reporters after the session that there was no press statement "because they are focusing on cessation of hostilities and we are focusing on fighting terrorists."
Nebenzia said Russia agrees with other council members on the need for humanitarian access, but questioned how many civilians are in need of assistance.
Sweden's U.N. Ambassador Olof Skoog, the current council president, had called the emergency consultations with Kuwait, the Arab representative on the council, hoping to get the 15 members to agree on a statement calling for an immediate cessation of hostilities and unrestricted access to deliver humanitarian aid.
Skoog said all members expressed concern about the humanitarian situation and "a broad majority of countries" believe it's urgent to implement a resolution adopted in February that calls for a cease-fire and humanitarian access
U.N. spokesman Stéphane Dujarric said Secretary General António Guterres "is gravely concerned by the resumption of the military offensive in southwest Syria and its continued devastating impact on civilians."
Guterres again appeals for "an immediate suspension of the hostilities and the resumption of negotiations," stressing that "an estimated 750,000 lives are in danger," he said.
