Why did IDF helicopters land near Damascus?

Israeli drones reportedly targeted an army unit near Al-Kiswah, eight miles south of Damascus, on Tuesday. Six soldiers were killed in the attack, according to the Syrian Arab News Agency. Syria’s Foreign Ministry later raised the death toll to eight, condemning the Israeli actions. The site was bombed again on Wednesday, according to state television.

A government source told SANA that soldiers had found “surveillance and eavesdropping devices” in the area before it was hit by Israeli strikes on Tuesday. Israel Hayom reported that "the raid was likely meant to counter the Syrian army's activity of trying to dismantle the installed Israeli listening devices," adding that the strikes prevented Syrian forces from reaching the site. However, another report suggested the devices had been planted by Turkey. 

A Syrian Defence Ministry official told AFP that the site was a former Assad regime military base in Tal Maneh. According to the MENA Research Centre, the base has been used by pro-Iranian terrorist groups. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that the site contained weapons used by the Iranian terrorist proxy Hezbollah.

Two years ago, the Israeli Air Force struck Iranian targets in the area.

According to the war monitor, this is the first Israeli raid of its kind since the fall of the Assad regime in December. The IDF has carried out hundreds of strikes in Syria since then and has taken control of Mount Hermon and the security zone to protect Israel's northern border communities.

SANA also reported an Israeli raid in the village of Tranja in Quneitra Province in southwestern Syria on Tuesday, which killed one person.

IDF troops will remain in their positions on Mount Hermon and in the security zone “to protect the communities of the Golan and the Galilee from threats emanating from the Syrian side, as the central lesson from the events of October 7,” Katz wrote in a Hebrew-language statement on Tuesday morning, referring to the Hamas-led invasion of the northwestern Negev on Oct. 7, 2023.

"We will also continue to protect the Druze in Syria,” he said.

Katz’s remarks came after Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa claimed on Sunday that there had been progress in the negotiations for renewed security understandings with Jerusalem based on the 1974 Disengagement of Forces Agreement that ended the Yom Kippur War.

While the president told reporters that he does not view the current circumstances as favorable for concluding a peace agreement, he said he would “not hesitate” to do so if he becomes convinced that this would benefit Syria and the region.

Syria last month claimed a willingness to re-implement the 1974 deal with Israel. After a phone call with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani said he intends “to cooperate with the United States to return to the 1974 disengagement agreement.”

During a visit to the Syrian side of Mount Hermon on Jan. 28, Katz said that the IDF would remain in the border region for as long as necessary.

“The IDF will remain at the summit of the Hermon and the security zone indefinitely to ensure the security of the communities of the Golan Heights and the north, and all the residents of Israel,” Katz said.