Middle East conflicts: Battles rage in Syria as Israel and Hezbollah trade fire, threatening truce

Israel's military said today that it had killed "seven terrorists" in "targeted strikes" in the center of the Gaza Strip.

The dead were members of Hamas and “took part in” the group's terror attack on Oct. 7, 2023, the IDF said in a statement.

The attack was carried out by troops of the 99th Division, which has been operating in the central Gaza Strip corridor area for “the past two weeks,” the IDF said.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said today that the Islamic Republic would consider sending forces to Syria if asked to by the Syrian government, state news reported.

Araghchi made the comment during an interview with a Qatari media outlet and Tasnim News Agency, a state news outlet, later reported the headline. The Islamic Republic of Iran has backed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad throughout the civil war alongside Russia.

Omer Netura, an IDF soldier who was among the Oct. 7, 2023, hostages held in Gaza, will be laid to rest on Long Island, where he was raised.

Neutra, 21, was an American dual citizen who was serving in the IDF at the time of the attack. Officials declared yesterday that he was presumed dead after more than a year as a hostage.

His family is holding his funeral today in Syosset, though his body remains in Gaza.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., are expected to attend the funeral along with several other New York public officials.

A Hezbollah commander was targeted in an Israeli strike in Damasus today, according to the Israel Defense Forces.

Salman Nemer Jamaa was in the country operating as Hezbollah's representative to the Syrian Armed Forces, the IDF said. Israel accused Syria of enabling Hezbollah's forces by allowing the Lebanon-based militant group to smuggle weapons through the country.

Hezbollah has fought on the ground in Syria in support of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad over the years.

The IDF said Jamaa was killed in the strike. Hezbollah has not publicly confirmed his death.

Video from Syrian opposition news outlet Shaam Network shows an empty and damaged Aleppo International Airport.

Syrian rebel forces claimed to have captured the airport over the weekend.

The death toll in Gaza since Oct. 7, 2023, has risen to over 44,500 people including 36 deaths in the past 24 hours, the Palestinian health ministry said today.

Over 105,000 people have been wounded, and thousands remain under rubble, the ministry said in a statement.

An Israeli strike hit a car "on the road to" Damascus International Airport, according to Syrian state news agency SANA, quoting a police source.

One person was killed in the attack, according to Syrian State News Radio SHAM FM, which reported that a car “believed to be Israeli” was "targeted."

Damascus International Airport, 20 miles southeast of Damascus, the capital, is the largest airport in Syria.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad must reconcile with his own people and hold talks with the opposition, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan has said.

After talks with Iranian counterpart Abbas Araghchi yesterday, Fidan said the pair have agreed to resume diplomatic efforts to help restore calm in Syria following last week’s surprise rebel offensive.

Turkey backs forces opposed to Assad, while Iran has thrown its support behind his government.

“Recent developments show once again that Damascus must reconcile with its own people and the legitimate opposition,” Fidan said at a joint news conference. “Turkey is ready to make all the necessary contribution toward this.”

Gaza is suffering from an "epidemic of traumatic injuries," the commissioner general of the United Nations refugee agency wrote on X today.

The enclave now suffers from the “highest number of child amputees per capita in the world,” Phillipe Lazzarini said.

The World Health Organization estimates that "one in four people injured during the war sustained life-changing injuries & will need rehabilitation services, including care for amputations & spinal cords injuries," he added.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has thrown his support behind Syria’s “government and people” during a phone call with President Bashar al-Assad, a statement from Assad’s office said on Telegram today.

It said the two leaders discussed “combating and defeating terrorism,” and that Maduro blamed the U.S. and the West for seeking to “weaken Syria”

Assad said “the fate of independent nations is to confront the schemes of the U.S. and the West against them.”

Israeli forces stormed the Turkish hospital in the occupied West Bank this morning and arrested its general manager and other citizens, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported today.

A "visitor" was shot inside the hospita, and Israeli forces arrested five medical personnel and assaulted the head of the emergency department, the agency reported.

An earlier report said that Israeli bombs killed two people after bombing a vehicle at the entrance of the hospital.

The Palestinian Health Ministry condemned the attack in a statement. It said Israeli forces had fired "bullets and bombs inside" inside the hospital and assaulted "staff and patients."

NBC News has reached out to the IDF for comment.

Qatar is working with Turkey and other partners in the region to bring solutions to end hostilities in Syria, Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesperson Majed Al-Ansari said in a press conference today.

When asked about reports in Iranian state media that Iran, Russia and Turkey would meet to discuss Syria at the Doha Forum foreign policy conference this weekend, Al-Ansari said he was not aware of any such plans, but that Qatar was always open.

Palestinians gathered at a United Nations distribution center in Gaza's southern city of Khan Younis to get their provisions of flour today.

The rebel group leading the offensive against Syria's government announced today that it is “accepting applications” from defectors in the northern city of Aleppo.

Hayat Tahrir al-Sham said in a statement that anyone who has worked for Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad’s regime “is required to visit the designated police stations and bring their personal identification, weapons, and any other relevant materials.”

Defectors must do this "no later than Friday," in order to obtain “temporary identification cards that would exempt them from legal prosecution and protect their rights,” the statement added.

Israel said it struck targets in Lebanon after promising to retaliate for a Hezbollah attack on its positions in the disputed Shebaa farms area.

At least 10 people were killed by Israeli strikes on two southern villages, the Lebanese Health Ministry said on X this morning. Another person was killed in a separate strike.

Israel said there were no injuries in Hezbollah’s strikes, which came as both sides accused each other of violating last week’s ceasefire agreement.

Shebaa Farms is an enclave where the borders of Israel, Lebanon and Syria meet. Israel says it is part of the Golan Heights, which it captured from Syria in 1967 and has controlled since.

Syrian and Russian warplanes have launched “concentrated air and missile strikes” on the central Idlib province, “killing and wounding dozens of terrorists and destroying their vehicles and weapons,” the Syrian Defense Ministry said today.

Syrian forces are advancing in the countryside near Aleppo, Hama and Idlib as it seeks to secure territory claimed by rebel forces.

Yesterday, Russian airstrikes targeted a group of health centers and hospitals in the rebel-held city of Idlib in northwest Syria, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights today.

President-elect Donald Trump said there will be “HELL TO PAY” unless the Israeli hostages still being held by Hamas in Gaza are freed before he takes office in January, in a social media post yesterday.

“Please let this TRUTH serve to represent that if the hostages are not released prior to January 20, 2025, the date that I proudly assume Office as President of the United States, there will be ALL HELL TO PAY in the Middle East, and for those in charge who perpetrated these atrocities against Humanity,” he said in the post on Truth Social.

"Those responsible will be hit harder than anybody who has been hit in the long and stories history of the United States of America," he added.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog thanked Trump in a post on X.

The conflict between Syrian regime and rebel forces risks spreading across the entire region, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said following talks in Syria with President Bashar al-Assad.

“Conflict carries 100%-guaranteed spillover of terrorism to the whole neighborhood,” he said on X yesterday. “All agreed: NO ONE benefits from another war in Syria.”

Araghchi reiterated Iran’s support for the “Syrian people, Government and Army in their fight against terrorism.”

His comments came after Iran-backed militias based crossed into Syria from Iraq, to support Assad's military, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Fighter jets and helicopters carried out 45 airstrikes near the Syrian city of Hama last night as the Syrian government tried to block rebel groups from advancing in the region, according to a leading monitoring group.

The U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in an online update that the clashes between government and rebel forces were "the most violent" since the rebels launched their shock offensive last week

The government had "upset attempts" by rebels to advance into the town of Qala'at Madiq, but that rebels had take control of several villages in the northern Hama countryside, it added.

• Syrian rebels reignite civil war with Assad’s allies focused on other fronts
• Former Israeli defense minister accuses his country of war crimes and ethnic cleansing in Gaza
• Israeli American soldier thought to have been taken hostage now presumed dead, IDF says