BEIRUT (Dispatches) -- A new resistance group has emerged in Syria, pledging to stage “surprise” strikes against Israeli forces and “terrorist gangs” of the country’s self-proclaimed “president” Abu Muhammad al-Julani.
The Islamic Resistance Front in Syria (IRFS) passed the remarks in a statement, noting that it had already staged one such strike against Israeli troops in the province of Quneitra in the country’s extreme southwest in late January.
The operation, it said, served to mark the start of its retaliation “against the Israeli enemy alongside our operations against the terrorist gangs of Julani,” it stated.
The development verified the predictions that have been made by many regional officials and resistance figures concerning imminent emergence of resistance fighters in the Arab country.
Less than two months into Syria’s takeover by Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, Israel has ramped up its deadly aggression against the country under the pretext of preventing spillover of violence into the Israeli occupied territories.
Despite the heavy toll Israeli attacks have taken on Syria’s civilian and military infrastructures, Julani has said he did not seek any conflict with Tel Aviv.
The new Syrian resistance faction described the circumstances surrounding its January 31 anti-Israeli strike, saying the operation forced Israeli troops to “retreat and withdraw.”
“We will not allow the Israeli regime to occupy our land, and we will be on the lookout for you and the Julani gangs with our precise ambushes and surprise attacks,” it said.
On Friday, Israeli Army Radio reported that armed men had opened fire on Israeli forces in the Quneitra countryside.
Israeli correspondent Doron Kadosh described the development as a “particularly unusual incident,” marking the first time in two months that armed men had reached “the area of operation of our forces and opened fire on them.”
“A group calling itself the Islamic Resistance Front in Syria claimed responsibility for firing at our forces...and it is too early to know whether this is the beginning of organized armed resistance” to Israeli activity in Syria, he said.
The IRFS is reportedly largely made up of Syria’s Shia Muslims, and previously used to call itself the “Southern Liberation Front.”
According to a statement, the group was established to “protect the Syrian people and push Israel out of Syrian territory.”