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occupied jerusalem — Israel acknowledged on Sunday that it carried out a weekend air strike on what it called an Iranian arms cache in Syria, and that it also completed a hunt for cross-border tunnels dug by Tehran-allied Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas.

Long wary of publicity around its operations against Iran-linked targets on its northern front, Israel has been lifting the veil in recent days — a sign of confidence in a campaign waged amid occasional tension with Syria’s big-power backer, Russia.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu may also be playing up his security credentials as he seeks re-election on April 9.

“We have been taking action with impressive success to arrest Iran’s military entrenchment in Syria,” Netanyahu told his cabinet in televised remarks, saying this entailed “hundreds” of attacks over the past several years of Syria’s civil war, in which Iranian and Hezbollah forces have backed the Damascus government against rebels and radical insurgents.

“In just the last 36 hours, the air force struck Iran’s warehouses, containing Iranian arms, in Damascus international airport,” he added, referring to a Friday night BEIRUT — Over 600 people were evacuated on Saturday from the Daesh group’s remaining holdout in eastern Syria, a monitor said, as US-backed fighters prepare for a final assault on the area.

“More than 600 people, mainly women and children, were evacuated on 25 buses sent” by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said that several dozen fighters were among those evacuated to areas held by the Kurdish-Arab alliance.

The SDF, backed by air strikes from a US-led coalition, in September

sortie that Syria said it had answered with anti-aircraft fire.

Syrian state media said at the time of the attack that the damage was limited to a hit on a warehouse at Damascus airport.

Netanyahu also cited an Israeli search-and-dismantle mission against suspected Hezbollah attack tunnels along the border with Lebanon that was launched in December and deemed completed on Sunday. launched an offensive to oust Daesh from the rump of the once-sprawling “caliphate” it proclaimed in 2014.

Abdel Rahman said some 16,000 people, including 760 Daesh fighters, have fled the area since the start of December.

But “this is the first time that buses have been provided by the SDF and coalition”, he said, suggesting a potential deal had been struck between the warring sides.

The UN said on Friday that overall some 25,000 people have fled the violence over the last six months as the die-hard militants have battled to defend their dwindling bastions. —

We have been taking action with impressive success to arrest Iran’s military entrenchment in Syria. In just the last 36 hours, the air force struck Iran’s warehouses, containing Iranian arms, in Damascus international airport Benjamin Netanyahu,

Israeli prime minister

The Israeli military said a sixth tunnel was found on Saturday, 55 metres deep and reaching “a few tens of metres” into Israeli territory from 800 metres within Lebanon.

“According to our assessments, there are no longer any tunnels crossing into Israel,” military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Jonathan Conricus said. He added that Hezbollah retained underground facilities on the Lebanese side.

Hezbollah has not commented on the tunnels, the existence of several of which was confirmed by UN peacekeepers in Lebanon.

Hezbollah and Israel last fought a war in 2006. While they have at times traded blows within Syria and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, the Israel-Lebanon border has mostly been quiet.

Citing intelligence assessments, Israel’s outgoing armed forces chief, Lt-Gen Gadi Eizenkot, told a local TV station on Saturday that the tunnels were prepared in secret, over a period of years. He said this was part of a Hezbollah plan to send as many as 1,500 fighters to infiltrate Israeli border communities during any future war. —