Israeli forces reportedly detain shepherd in fresh incursion near Al-Rafid, Syria

Israeli forces have carried out repeated incursions into the Quneitra countryside in southern Syria, according to Syrian and regional reports. Anadolu (aa.com.tr) reported that Syria’s state-run news agency SANA and Syrian media described a pattern of raids, searches, arrests and military checkpoints in the area. Quneitra province borders the occupied Syrian Golan Heights. Anadolu reported that these activities intensified after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in late 2024, and that Israel declared the 1974 disengagement agreement invalid and seized control of the Syrian buffer zone.

According to SANA, Israeli occupation forces arrested a civilian who was herding sheep west of the town of Al-Rafid on Tuesday. SANA reported that the man was released the following day. The reports do not describe the circumstances of that arrest beyond what is stated here.

SANA also reported that on Thursday the Israeli army assaulted a shepherd and ran over several of his sheep, killing them, during an incursion into the countryside of Quneitra. According to SANA, the incident took place between Al-Asha village and Al-Rafid town. SANA said the Israeli forces beat the shepherd and ran over the animals before withdrawing from the area. These are the reported claims of SANA, and the supplied material does not include an independent account of the incident.

The Alikhbariah television channel, as cited by Anadolu, reported a different sequence. It said Israeli forces advanced west of Al-Rafid on Friday. Syrian media, as cited by Anadolu, reported that Israeli forces advanced again west of Al-Rafid in the southern Quneitra countryside on Sunday. Alikhbariah reported that Israeli forces detained a shepherd during the Sunday incursion. Unlike the SANA account of Tuesday’s arrest, this report does not say whether or when that shepherd was released, and it does not state whether it is the same person described in the other reports.

The two accounts therefore differ on dates and on the details of the detentions, and the supplied reports do not reconcile them. Taken together, they describe a shepherd who was arrested in the area, a shepherd who was beaten and whose sheep were killed, and a separate detention reported on Sunday. Neither report gives a casualty figure beyond the sheep reported killed, and the material does not include a statement from the Israeli government or the Israeli military on these incidents.

For a shepherd who lost his flock and was beaten while tending it, the defense of the vulnerable is the plain duty owed to him (Psalm 82:3). The story’s last reported fact, according to Alikhbariah, is that Israeli forces detained a shepherd during the incursion west of Al-Rafid on Sunday.