ISRAELI troops raided a Syrian town today, kidnapping two people.

Over 100 soldiers in 15 armoured vehicles rattled into Jubata al-Khashab, a settlement in the United Nations Disengagement Observer Zone, which forms a buffer between Syrian-controlled territory and the Golan Heights, occupied by Israel since 1967 but recognised as Syrian by every country except Israel, the US and lately Colombia.

The cross-border attack follows Israeli shelling of Syria’s Daraa governorate and the bombing of an air base in Idlib, near the Turkish border, both on Tuesday.

The attack on the Abu Duhur air base brought a rare rebuke from the United States, which called it an “unnecessary escalation.” Israel says Syria was on “the verge of breaching” an alleged commitment not to allow Turkey to use the base.

US ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack warned of a “real risk of rapid escalation into a direct military confrontation” between Israel and Turkey, which has been repairing the air base.

Both are US allies, but relations between them are frosty and Israel has been alarmed by the recent alliance announced by Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. Turkey’s military shielded a jihadist regime in Idlib headed by the country’s current President Ahmed al-Sharaa for years before it swept to power across Syria in late 2024. Syrian authorities complained to the UN on Tuesday about an increase in Israeli attacks.

Also today, Israeli bombing killed at least nine people in Gaza City, while the government announced criminal investigations into two notorious war crimes by its soldiers, the killing of five-year-old Hind Rajab in 2024 and the attack on World Central Kitchen aid workers in 2025, which killed 15.