Negotiations to Guarantee Tahrir al-Sham Evacuation from Syria’s Beit Jin

A view of Mount Hermon as seen from Jubata al-Khashab in Quneitra province, Syria. (Reuters)
A view of Mount Hermon as seen from Jubata al-Khashab in Quneitra province, Syria. (Reuters)
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Negotiations to Guarantee Tahrir al-Sham Evacuation from Syria’s Beit Jin

A view of Mount Hermon as seen from Jubata al-Khashab in Quneitra province, Syria. (Reuters)
A view of Mount Hermon as seen from Jubata al-Khashab in Quneitra province, Syria. (Reuters)

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights announced that negotiations are ongoing in the southwestern Damascus countryside to reach an agreement over ensuring the exit of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham from from the region.

The plan is to transport them to the northern Idlib province.

The negotiations for the plan came after weeks of heavy rocket fire and barrel bombing of the region by the Syrian regime, said “trusted” sources.

They were made possible recently after the regime and its allies were able to surround the opposition factions and Hayat Tahrir al-Sham in a narrow area in the town of Beit Jin that is close to the border with Lebanon and Israel, they added.

The regime and its Iran-backed allied were able to infiltrate the last remaining opposition stronghold near the strategic Lebanese-Israeli border.

The enclave is the last rebel bastion left in the southwest of Damascus known as the Western Ghouta that had since last year fallen under government control after months of heavy bombing on civilian areas and years of siege tactics that forced rebels to surrender.

A western intelligence source confirmed rebel reports that Iranian-backed local factions alongside commanders from the Lebanese “Hezbollah” group were playing a major role in the ongoing battles.

“The Iranian-backed militias are trying to consolidate their sphere of influence all the way from southwest of Damascus to the Israeli border,” said Suhaib al Ruhail, an official from the Liwa al Furqan rebel group that operates in the area.

Worried by Iran’s expanding influence in Syria after the defeat of ISIS, Israel has in recent weeks stepped up its strikes against suspected Iranian targets inside Syria.

Early this month there was an Israeli strike on a base near Kiswah, south of Damascus, that was widely believed to be an Iranian military compound, a Western intelligence source said.

Israel has been lobbying Washington and Moscow to deny Iran, “Hezbollah” and other militias any permanent bases in Syria, and to keep them away from the Golan, as they gain ground while helping Damascus beat back rebels.

The southwest of Syria is part of a de-escalation zone in southern Syria agreed last July between Russia and the United States, the first such understanding between the two powers.

The area has not seen Russian bombing, unlike other ceasefire areas in Syria.



At Least 91 Palestinians Killed in Gaza as Israel Abandons Ceasefire, Orders Evacuation

Palestinians inspect a destroyed house after an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, northern Gaza Strip, 19 March 2025. EPA/HAITHAM IMAD
Palestinians inspect a destroyed house after an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, northern Gaza Strip, 19 March 2025. EPA/HAITHAM IMAD
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At Least 91 Palestinians Killed in Gaza as Israel Abandons Ceasefire, Orders Evacuation

Palestinians inspect a destroyed house after an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, northern Gaza Strip, 19 March 2025. EPA/HAITHAM IMAD
Palestinians inspect a destroyed house after an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, northern Gaza Strip, 19 March 2025. EPA/HAITHAM IMAD

At least 91 Palestinians were killed and dozens wounded in airstrikes across Gaza on Thursday after Israel resumed bombing and ground operations, the Gaza health ministry said.
After two months of relative peace, Gazans were again fleeing for their lives after Israel effectively abandoned a ceasefire, launching a new all-out air and ground campaign.
Israeli aircraft dropped leaflets on residential neighbourhoods, ordering people out of Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun towns in the north, the Shejaia district in Gaza City and towns on the eastern outskirts of Khan Younis in the south.

More than 400 Palestinians were killed on Tuesday alone, mostly women and children, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. There have been no reports of Hamas firing rockets or carrying out other attacks.

More than 49,000 Palestinians have been killed in the ensuing conflict with the enclave reduced to rubble, according to Reuters.

The Israeli military said it intercepted a missile launched by Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi group early Thursday before it reached Israeli airspace, as air raid sirens and exploding interceptors were heard in Jerusalem. No injuries were reported. It was the second such attack since the United States began a new campaign of airstrikes against Hamas earlier this week.

One of the strikes on Gaza early Thursday hit the Abu Daqa family’s home in Abasan al-Kabira, a village just outside of Khan Younis near the border with Israel. It was inside an area the Israeli military ordered evacuated earlier this week, encompassing most of eastern Gaza.

The strike killed at least 16 people, mostly women and children, according to the nearby European Hospital, which received the dead. Those killed included a father and his seven children, as well as the parents and brother of a month-old baby who survived along with her grandparents.

“Another tough night,” said Hani Awad, who was helping rescuers search for more survivors in the rubble. “The house collapsed over the people’s heads.”

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the latest strikes. The military says it only targets militants and blames civilian deaths on Hamas because it is deeply embedded in residential areas.

Israeli ground troops advance

On Wednesday, Israeli ground troops advanced in Gaza for the first time since the ceasefire took hold in January, seizing part of a corridor separating the northern third of the territory from the south.

Israel, which has also cut off the supply of food, fuel and humanitarian aid to Gaza's roughly 2 million Palestinians, has vowed to intensify its operations until Hamas releases the 59 hostages it holds — 35 of whom are believed dead — and gives up control of the territory. The Trump administration, which took credit for brokering the ceasefire, says it fully supports Israel.

Hamas has said it will only release the remaining hostages in exchange for a lasting ceasefire and a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, as called for in the ceasefire agreement they reached in January after more than a year of mediation by the United States, Egypt and Qatar.

Hamas, which does not accept Israel's existence, says it is willing to hand over power to the Western-backed Palestinian Authority or a committee of political independents but will not lay down its arms until Israel ends its decades-long occupation of lands the Palestinians want for a future state.

A ‘bloody night’ for hard-hit northern town

The European Hospital in the southern city of Rafah said it received 36 bodies after the overnight strikes, mostly women and children. The Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis received seven and transferred four to European, which were included in its count. In northern Gaza, the Indonesian Hospital said it had received 19 bodies after strikes in the town of Beit Lahiya near the border.

“It was a bloody night for the people of Beit Lahiya,” said Fares Awad, head of the Health Ministry’s emergency service in northern Gaza, adding that rescuers were still searching the rubble from homes that were hit. “The situation is catastrophic.”

Beit Lahiya was heavily destroyed and largely depopulated during the first phase of the war before January’s ceasefire. On Wednesday, an Israeli strike on a gathering of mourners killed 17 people there, according to health officials.