Israel Drops Flyers During Syria Strike Threatening Troops

Leaflets demand troops stop cooperating with Hezbollah

During last night’s Israeli attacks in Quineitra, Israel dropped threatening leaflets into Syrian bases, ordering them to stop cooperating with Hezbollah and warning that doing so has “brought you destruction.”

While propaganda leaflets aren’t unheard of for Israel, this one is noteworthy because it explicitly claims credit for previous strikes which the Israeli government had not commented on. Israel largely doesn’t confirm its attacks on Syria.

Ironically, Israel has refused to comment on the leaflets themselves, though they don’t appear to be in any real question. The leaflets contain the symbol of the Israeli military’s 210th Division, which is active in the occupied Golan Heights.

It’s not clear what impact threatening Syrian troops at the ground level might have, as naturally decisions to cooperate with Hezbollah are made at a national level by the Syrian government, not among individual troops stationed close to Israel.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.