The Israeli army said in a statement on Sunday that it carried out a ground attack on Syria and captured a Syrian citizen who was involved in Iranian networks. Israel announced that its soldiers were operating on Syrian territory for the first time in the current war.

Israel carried out airstrikes in Syria several times last year, targeting members of Lebanese Hezbollah and officials of both Hezbollah and Syria’s close ally Iran. However, it had not previously publicly announced any ground invasion into Syria.

The Israeli military said the seizure was part of a special operation “carried out in recent months” but did not say exactly when it took place. Syria did not immediately confirm the announcement, but pro-government Syrian radio station Damascus FM reported on Sunday that Israeli forces had carried out a “kidnapping operation” targeting a man in the south of the country over the summer.

Israel launches escalating bombing campaign in Lebanon For the last six weeks, a ground operation has been carried out along the common borders of the two countries that have vowed to cripple Hezbollah. On Saturday, an Israeli military official said naval forces raided a town in northern Lebanon and captured what they called a senior Hezbollah operative.

The army identified the man as Ali Suleiman al-Assi, saying he lived in the Saida region in southern Syria. It was stated that the man had been under military surveillance for months and participated in Iranian attempts to target areas of the Golan Heights, annexed by Israel, close to the Syrian border.

Body camera video of the raid released by the military shows soldiers apprehending a man in a white T-shirt inside a building. The army said the man was brought to Israel for questioning.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the Lebanese border on Sunday, saying his focus was on trying to prevent Hezbollah from rearming itself through the “oxygen lifeline” of Iranian weapons being transferred to Lebanon via Syria. Israel says its operation in Lebanon is aimed at driving Hezbollah away from the border and ending the group’s fire on northern Israel for more than a year.

More than 2,500 people lost their lives in Israeli attacks on Lebanon last year. 69 people died in Israel due to Hezbollah’s rockets.

On the US presidential campaign trail this weekend, Vice President Kamala Harris acknowledged that there are progressives and members of the state’s significant Arab American population who are angry at the Biden administration for continuing the US alliance with Israel while Netanyahu’s government presses its war against Hamas. In Gaza.

“I have made it very clear that the death toll of innocent Palestinians is immeasurable,” Harris told reporters.

He addressed the issue shortly after starting his speech in East Lansing, Michigan. “As president, I will do everything in my power to end the war in Gaza, bring the hostages home, end the suffering in Gaza, ensure that Israel is safe, and ensure that the Palestinian people can realize their right to freedom, dignity and self-determination,” he said.

Some students in East Lansing voiced their opposition Sunday with vocal calls for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war. At least one participant was escorted out after calls for a ceasefire.

Meanwhile, Israeli forces continued their offensive in the northern Gaza Strip, where the army said it was fighting Hamas fighters who had regrouped there.

Hospital director Hossam Abu Safiya told the media that a shell fire hit Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, injuring patients, including children. He said that right after a delegation from the World Health Organization finished its visit, artillery shells hit the nursery, dormitory and water tanks of the hospital.

During the clashes, Kamal Adwan and two other nearby hospitals were hit several times by Israel. During the raid, Abu Safiya said that earlier this month, Israeli troops raided Kamal Adwan and detained a number of people, including most of the staff. The army said, without presenting evidence, that those detained included Hamas members and that weapons were found at the facility.

But the Israel Defense Forces denied shooting Kamal Adwan on Sunday, blaming the attack on “an explosive planted by terrorist organizations in Gaza”.

“Attacks against civilians, including humanitarian workers, and what remains of Gaza’s civilian facilities and infrastructure must stop,” UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell said in a statement on Saturday. “The entire Palestinian population in northern Gaza, especially children, is at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine and ongoing bombardments.”

An Israeli attack hit a group of people gathered in an area east of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, killing at least eight Palestinians, including four children and one woman, the region’s Health Ministry emergency services said. The city’s Nasser Hospital, which received most of the bodies, confirmed the figures.

Palestinian officials said Saturday that an Israeli drone strike hit a clinic where children were vaccinated against polio in northern Gaza, injuring six people, including four children. The Israeli army denied responsibility.

Gaza Ministry of Health general director Dr. Munir al-Boursh told The Associated Press that a quadcopter crashed into the Sheikh Radwan clinic in Gaza City on Saturday afternoon, just minutes after the United Nations delegation left the facility.

UNICEF and WHO, which jointly run the polio vaccine campaign, expressed concern about the reported strike. UNICEF spokeswoman Rosalia Bollen said the strike took place as a “humanitarian pause” that Israel agreed to authorize vaccines was coming into effect.

Israeli military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani said, “Contrary to the claims, the initial investigation determined that the Israeli army did not attack the region at the specified time.”

It was not possible to resolve the conflicting accounts. Israeli forces repeatedly raided hospitals in Gaza throughout the war and suggested that Hamas was using these hospitals for militant purposes, but Palestinian health officials denied these allegations. Hamas fighters are also fighting Israeli forces in the north.

Northern Gaza has been surrounded and largely isolated by Israeli forces for the past year. Israel has launched another attack in recent weeks, killing hundreds of people and displacing tens of thousands.

A scaled-back campaign to administer the second dose of the polio vaccine began in some areas of northern Gaza on Saturday. It had been postponed from October 23 due to lack of access, Israeli bombings and mass evacuation orders, and lack of assurances regarding humanitarian pauses, according to a UN statement.

The administration of the first doses took place in the Gaza Strip, including the north, in September.

At least 100,000 people have been forced to evacuate from areas in northern Gaza towards Gaza City in the past few weeks, but approximately 15,000 children under the age of 10 remain in inaccessible northern towns, including Jabaliya, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun. According to the UN.

The latest phase of the polio vaccination campaign aims to reach an estimated 119,000 children in the north with a second dose of oral polio vaccine, but “due to access restrictions, achieving this target is now unlikely,” the agencies said.

They say 90 percent of children in every community should be vaccinated to prevent the spread of the disease.

The campaign was launched after the first polio case in Gaza in 25 years was reported; A 10-month-old boy whose leg is currently paralyzed. The World Health Organization said the presence of one case of stroke indicates there may be hundreds more who are infected but do not show symptoms.

The war began on October 7, 2023, when Hamas-led militants raided southern Israel, killing nearly 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping 250 others. According to Gaza health officials, Israel’s offensive has killed more than 43,000 Palestinians. How many were warriors, but more than half are said to be women and children.