Arab media outlets reported that the target of the attack was a Hezbollah outpost near the Israeli border.

Overnight Wednesday, Syrian state media alleged that one person was killed and six others were wounded in an Israeli strike on the Mediterranean port city of Latakia, in the country's northwest.

Syrian air defense units responded to Wednesday night's missile attacks, the report said, without giving further details.

Syrian state media later quoted an unnamed military official as saying a plastic factory and other targets were struck in Syria's coastal region. It added that Syrian air defense units shot down some of the Israeli missiles before they reached their targets.

It said the casualties were civilians.

Israel has launched hundreds of strikes against Iran-linked military targets in Syria over the years but rarely acknowledges or discusses such operations.

Israel views Iranian entrenchment on its northern frontier as a red line, and it has repeatedly struck Iran-linked facilities and weapons convoys destined for Lebanon's terrorist Hezbollah group.

The airstrike at dawn Wednesday occurred nearly two weeks after an errant Syrian anti-aircraft missile hit deep into Israeli territory and set off air raid sirens near the Dimona nuclear reactor in the south.

The incident prompted Israel to respond with airstrikes on the missile launcher and other targets in Syria.

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Efforts to secure the release of a 25-year-old Israeli woman from Modiin Illit who crossed into Syria from the Quneitra Crossing were ongoing, Wednesday night.

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National Security Adviser Meir Ben-Shabbat and special negotiator for hostages and prisoners of war Yaron Blum returned from Moscow, Wednesday night, following 48 hours of mediation and talks between Israel, Russia, and Syria that also included Israel's Ambassador to Moscow Alexander Ben Zvi.

Senior Israeli officials believe that a deal on the matter will be finalized in the coming days.

According to Syrian media reports, in return for the release of the Israeli citizen, Jerusalem will release two residents of the Golan Heights, one Druze and the other an Arab Israeli, convicted for aiding Hezbollah. The two terrorists, however, have refused to be deported to Syria as part of the deal.

Mediation efforts to secure the woman's release have been ongoing for two weeks now. According to foreign reports, the woman suffers from a mental illness and may have entered the enemy territory due to a romantic relationship with a Syrian citizen.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declined to comment on the reports in an interview with Army Radio, Wednesday night.

"We are acting to save lives. All I can say is that I am using my personal ties with [Russian] President [Vladmir] Putin. We are in the midst of sensitive contacts. We are acting discreetly and responsibly, and I believe we will resolve it," he said.

According to Arab media reports, the woman in question is a member of Israel's Haredi sector.

According to Syrian reports, should the deal move forward, the two Israeli residents, who see themselves as Syrian, were Nihal Al-Maqt and Dhiyab Qahmuz. According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Al-Maqt is not in prison but rather under house arrest in the Druze town of Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights. She has yet to go on trial.

Lebanese media reports said the prisoner exchange deal would also see Israel agree to limit its strikes on Syria.

As part of the close cooperation between the two countries, Syrian media reported Russian soldiers have been conduction operations for several years to locate the bodies of missing Israelis in Syria.

On Tuesday, Netanyahu hastily convened a secretive cabinet meeting. Although details of the one-hour meeting were largely shrouded in secrecy, the press was informed Israel had asked Russia to use its influence with Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime to help with what was defined as a "humanitarian" matter.

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Four Lebanese Hezbollah militia bases were established in southern Syria over the past year – three in the Daraa Governorate and one in the Quneitra Governorate. These bases train new volunteers for the militias and are among the main armament facilities for the militia in southern Syria.

1. In early 2019, a big Hezbollah airbase was established in Daraa, similar to the military airbase next to Kraiym, north of Lajat. The militia dug many tunnels and facilities inside of bases, using them as special training bases for new fighters. Two of the officers in the camp, Adel and Rashid, have Lebanese citizenship. In addition, a number of trainers have Lebanese citizenship. There are eight trainers, who cooperate with officers that are part of the ninth company of Syria's military and with officers from the National Security Division, who ensure transport and supply routes.
2. A general base was established in early September after the Al-Namar militia forces expelled the population from a number of villages in the area of Lajat. They emptied these villages of their residents under the pretext that they included ISIS elements, and then Hezbollah transformed the civilian homes into military barracks.
   The ninth and fifth companies of Syria's army are under the direct control of El Haj Abu Hadi, one of the most prominent Hezbollah members in southern Syria. In addition, Hezbollah uses this base as a weapons and ammunition facility for short- and medium-range rocket launchers. These weapons were stored in Iraq and then transferred with the assistance of the Asaib Ahl Al Haq militia from Al-Dumayr Military Airport on the outskirts of Damascus to the area of Lajat.
3. The 52nd Brigade was established in January 2019 after the withdrawal of Hezbollah forces from Al-Zabadani and the Rima farms that surround it. They transformed the retreating forces into the 52nd Brigade near the town of Al-Hrak, northeast of Daraa, under the command of Yad Kassem, a Lebanese citizen living in Kirak. He is guarded by a soldier who is part of the Syrian Air Force Intelligence Unit.
4. Sabir Base was established in late 2018 under the direct supervision of Mustafa Mughniyeh, an officer in charge of the Hezbollah's Golan Heights portfolio, whose father Imad and brother Jihad were both Hezbollah leaders killed in attacks attributed to Israel. This base is under the command of the Golan Unit, which belongs to the 90th Brigade of the Syrian Army and is located between the villages of Hader and Harfa, north of Quneitra.

Hezbollah established these bases in order to obtain widespread control over the region. They seek to obtain regional domination on behalf of the Iranian regime with the assistance of families who utilize child soldiers. In recent months, Hezbollah has recruited hundreds of residents of the Quneitra region. Hezbollah also supplied spy equipment and listening devices at the beginning of this year to locals so that they could observe their enemies and also has a number of Hezbollah fighters with Lebanese citizenship based in the area. The Sokor Al Quneitra Division, which is close to Hezbollah, guarantees a supply route from the Set Zaynab area on the outskirts of Damascus and from the Erneh region south of Mount Hermon. A table showing these groups spreading along the border with the Golan Heights is in the possession of the Safadi Center but we chose not to publish it for security reasons.

In any event, Israel's struggle to repel these groups from the Golan Heights border is of critical importance. The presence of these groups in the region poses an existential threat. It is of great importance that Israel nip this threat in the bud and defend its security interests along the Israeli border. Failure to do so will strengthen Iranian hegemony in the Middle East. This is why Israel has been attacking Iran in Syria and must continue to do so.

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According to the Syrian state news agency's report, the country's air-defense systems were activated against "hostile missiles" launched from the Israeli Golan Heights and Israeli aircraft west of Damascus. In addition, According to the report, two further explosions were heard around 1:00 a.m., one in the Quneitra area and a second in Tal al-Hara, adjacent to Quneitra.

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Syria accused Israel of the strikes but Israel neither confirmed nor denied the reports. Israel is keeping close tabs on developments in Syria after reports earlier this week said that Druze Hezbollah operative Mashhour Zidan, had been assassinated in Quneitra.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that the attack was directed, among other targets, against weapons storage sites used by Hezbollah and other pro-Iranian militias in Syria's and housing long-range missiles and other weaponry. It was further reported that one of the missiles had exploded inside a base in western Damascus where large forces of pro-Iranian militias in Syria were stationed.

The zone has been a target of Israeli raids against Tehran-backed militias which have become entrenched in southern Syria and the Golan Heights near the border with Israel.

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The deal, confirmed in its general outlines by a monitoring group and opposition activists in Quneitra, will put the Syrian government face-to-face with Israel along most of its southern frontier for the first time since 2011, when an uprising against Syrian President Bashar Assad's rule swept throughout Syria.

Israel has refrained from taking sides in Syria's seven-year-long civil war, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has indicated he does not object to the government's return to southwest Syria – as long as Iran and its regional proxy, Hezbollah, stay clear of the border.

Israel has also said it would demand strict adherence to the 1974 disengagement deal with the Syrian army on the Golan, threatening a "harsh response" to any attempt by Syrian forces to deploy in that zone. The deal, concluded after the 1973 Yom Kippur War, created a buffer zone patrolled by the U.N. Disengagement and Observer Force.

Details of the deal sent by the rebel source included a provision that Russian military police would accompany the same two Syrian army brigades "to the cease-fire line and the demilitarized zone, according to the 1974 agreement."

The provisions did not elaborate on any implications of the deployment of military units on the 1974 agreement.

U.S. President Donald Trump said at a news conference with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday in Helsinki that both had agreed to work together to help ensure Israel's security.

Putin, Assad's most powerful ally, cited the need to restore the situation along the Golan borders to the state that prevailed before the outbreak of the Syrian crisis in 2011.

A fleet of buses reached Quneitra on Thursday night to pick up fighters, activists and other residents who refuse to accept the terms of surrender, and evacuate them to rebel-held areas in northern Syria, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said.

An affiliate of the Islamic State group continues to hold a sliver of the frontier. The group is not party to the agreement between the government and rebels.

Backed by Russian air power and unopposed by Assad's foreign adversaries, government forces have swept through southwestern Syria in the last month in one of the swiftest campaigns of the war, forcing surrender on massively outgunned rebels.

The campaign, which has already restored Assad's control over a critical portion of the frontier with Jordan, marks another milestone in his efforts to recover control of the country.

Echoing surrender terms imposed on rebels elsewhere, opposition fighters agreed to give up heavy and medium-sized weapons. Those wishing to stay in the area will "settle" their status with the state, meaning accepting a return of its rule.

Those who reject the deal will be given safe passage out to the opposition-held province of Idlib in the northwest, according to terms that were also reported by a military news outlet run by Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran and is fighting in Syria in support of Assad.

Once the southwestern campaign is finished, Assad's focus is likely to turn to the two remaining areas outside his grasp.

These are the rebel-held northwest, where the presence of Turkish forces will complicate any military campaign, and large areas of the northeast and east that are held by Kurdish-led militias, supported by 2,000 U.S. troops on the ground.

Delegations from the government and rebels met several times over the last two days to negotiate the terms of surrender, said opposition activist and photographer Moaz al-Assaad.

Thousands of residents – including rebel fighters, media activists, medical workers and civilians – may be heading to north Syria instead of staying behind in Quneitra, according to al-Assaad.

The U.N. and human rights organizations have condemned such evacuations as forced displacement. Few who have left are expecting to be able to return to their homes in the near-term.

Earlier on Thursday, a fleet of buses helped evacuate the last remaining residents from Shiite, pro-government villages in northern Syria that endured three years of rebel siege, to government territory in the nearby Aleppo province.

Some 7,000 people were evacuated from Foua and Kfraya, according to state media.

The transfers, which have become a fixture of the war's later stages, are a conspicuous marker of the titanic shifts in Syria's demographics.

Waves of violence against civilians and unforgiving terms of surrender have resulted in the reassortment of the Syrian population. The country's majority Sunni population has been pushed out of the cities and, disproportionately, into camps and exile, while minorities have moved closer to the centers of government control.

The government was expected to release 1,500 militants and opposition activists from its jails in exchange for the Foua and Kfraya evacuations, according to Ahmed el-Shiekho, an official for the Syrian Civil Defense, a search-and-rescue group aligned with the opposition.

But it only released 200, el-Sheikho said, including many who were only picked up in the last few months for minor criminal offenses – prisoners with no connection to the ongoing political turmoil.

In southern Syria, rebels have been powerless to stop a month of government advances through southwest Syria's Daraa and Quneitra provinces, facilitated by a relentless Russian aerial campaign against towns and villages held by the opposition.

Tens of thousands of civilians have been displaced by the fighting, and the U.N.'s children's agency, UNICEF, appealed for access to reach some 55,000 children in need of humanitarian assistance in Quneitra.

Earlier this week, dozens of Syrians marched toward the frontier, pleading for help as government forces, backed by Russia, stepped up airstrikes on Quneitra. Israel has quietly treated thousands of displaced Syrians for wounds and illnesses over the years.

On Thursday, the IDF announced that its 210th Division carried out six special missions this week to provide humanitarian aid to Syrians in refugee camps on the Golan Heights. The aid included 72 tons of food, 70 tents, 9,000 liters (2,400 gallons) of gasoline, flats of medicine and medical supplies, as well as clothes and toys.

"The IDF is continuing to help the Syrians in the camps set up on the Syrian Golan Heights," the military said.

Many of those trapped by the Syrian government's advances were hoping for relief from Israel, or some sort of a safe zone there, said Areej Ghabash, a local health worker in Quneitra.

"In truth, we have more faith in Israel than the [Syrian] government," she said, adding she would leave Quneitra herself rather than surrender to the authorities.

Al-Assaad said a prisoner exchange involving an al-Qaida-linked group fighting alongside the rebels in Quneitra was still to be negotiated before evacuations could start.

The Syrian leader, with support from Russia and Iran, has all but crushed the revolt after seven years of destructive war that has taken the lives of more than 400,000 Syrians and displaced half the country's population. Nearly 6 million Syrians – or roughly a quarter of the country's pre-war population – are now refugees outside their own country.

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Touring the Israeli Golan Heights, Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman ramped up threats to use armed force should regime forces encroach on the border. "Any Syrian soldier who will be in the buffer zone risks his life," Lieberman told reporters.

Syrian government forces backed by Russia have launched an offensive in the southern Daraa province and are widely expected to move on rebel-held Quneitra, which is within an area covered by the armistice.

Israel worries that Syria's President Bashar Assad could let its enemies Iran and Hezbollah move forces into the area, giving them a foothold near its border. Tehran and the Lebanese terrorist group both back Assad in the complex conflict.

"For our part, we will honor the 1974 disengagement agreement, and there too we will insist that every last letter be abided by, and any violation will meet a harsh response from the State of Israel," Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman said.

Assad's conduct in southern Syria is expected to come up in talks in Moscow on Wednesday between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Russia, whose 2015 intervention in the Syrian civil war turned the tide in Assad's favor, has largely turned a blind eye to repeated Israeli airstrikes in Syria targeting suspected Iranian or Hezbollah emplacements and arms transfers.

But diplomats on both sides say Russia has made clear that it would oppose any Israeli action endangering Assad's rule.

On Sunday night, Syria said its air defense repelled a sortie against the T4 air base in Homs province that reportedly killed nine people. According to foreign media reports, Israel was responsible for the attack.

Jerusalem, in keeping with its customary reticence on such operations, declined all comment.

"Regarding yesterday – I read about it in the newspapers today, and I have nothing to add," Lieberman said on Monday.

"Perhaps just one thing, that our policy has not changed. We will not allow Iran's entrenchment in Syria and we will not allow Syrian soil to be turned into a vanguard against the State of Israel. Nothing has changed. There is nothing new.

"Iran's very presence in Syria is, from our perspective, unacceptable. We are not prepared to accept Iran's presence anywhere in Syria. … As soon as we identify an Iranian presence, we will act."

He said that terrorist "forces affiliated with the [Iran-led] axis are making efforts, under the protection of the [Syrian] regime, to establish infrastructure in the Syrian Golan [Heights]."

Calling these efforts "unacceptable," Lieberman said Israel would "act with force against any terrorist infrastructure that we see and identify in the area."

He said that "from our perspective, the regime is responsible and it will also be held responsible and pay a heavy price for collaborating with axis members and the amount and extent of the forces, in accordance with the [1974] agreement."

Asked by a reporter if he anticipated a time when the Quneitra crossing would be reopened under the U.N.-monitored armistice between Israel and Syria, and whether the two old enemies could establish "some kind of relationship," Lieberman said, "I reckon we are a long way from that, but we are not ruling out anything."

His remarks could foreshadow a more open approach to Assad ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on Wednesday, his second in two months. At the meeting, Netanyahu will look to maintain Israel's freedom to carry out attacks on Iranians bases inside Syria from the country's air space.

Netanyahu cautioned both Iran and Syria after talks in Jerusalem on Tuesday with Russia's envoy to Syria, Alexander Lavrentiev, and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Vershinin. National Security Adviser Meir Ben-Shabbat was also in attendance at the meeting.

"At the meeting [with Putin], the prime minister will make clear that Israel will not tolerate military entrenchment by Iran or its proxies anywhere in Syria, and that Syria must abide meticulously by the 1974 separation agreement," an official statement said.

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