Raid on Beit Jinn kills at least 13, including children

Summary

At least 13 people, including children, were killed in an Israeli operation on the village of Beit Jinn on the edge of the occupied Golan Heights overnight, Syrian state media reported. Sana said residents "confronted" Israeli troops, triggering a firefight and air strikes; a local hospital reported receiving bodies, including five from one family, and dozens wounded. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said its troops entered to detain members of the Jamaa Islamiya group accused of planning attacks on Israeli civilians, and that several armed fighters opened fire. The IDF released footage showing air strikes and bodycam video of exchanges of gunfire, and said all suspects were apprehended while a number of militants were killed; six Israeli soldiers were also injured, three seriously.

Syria's foreign ministry condemned the raid as a "fully-fledged war crime" and urged the UN Security Council to act, saying more than 10 civilians — including women and children — had died. The clash comes amid repeated Israeli incursions into southern Syria, where Israel says it aims to prevent militant groups from operating near the Golan and to block Syrian army deployments in the buffer zone established after the 1973 war. The UN has described recent Israeli deployments there as a violation of the ceasefire agreement, and US-mediated talks on a security arrangement have so far not succeeded, as reported by BBC

This story has also been reported by: The Guardian