Global SITREP B3-23: Israel's 75th

UPDATED 23 April 2023: Israel's 75th year of its modern existence will be celebrated on Tuesday-Wednesday of this week. The following day, Thursday, April 27th, is the date sets by Israel's Coalition Government and its Security Cabinet upon which the IDF will be unrestrained from severe (read: disproportionate) responses to any and all acts of terror against Israel. This new policy will continue even at the risk of full-scale war against Israel's enemies. 

This SITREP has been posted early in anticipation of potential enemy preemptive actions while Israel commemorates its Memorial Day beginning tomorrow from sundown through Tuesday. Israel's Memorial Day honors fallen IDF soldiers and civilian victims of Islamic acts of jihad. Iran's Twelver Ayatollah has again this morning reiterated his personal threat about the imminent destruction of the State of Israel.

Syria being destroyed by 13 years of continuous warfare.

28 April 2023: Key to the Twelver clerics offensive against Israel is the Rif Dimashq governorate illustrated in the map below. This vast area of southern Syria has seen continuous Israeli air, missile and artillery strikes over the past few years. These strikes have intensified in the first four months of 2023 in a campaign to dislodge both the IRGC, its proxy militias and Hezbollah of Lebanon from their bases. These bombardments have not succeeded in their objective as yet.

Syria's Rif Dimashq Governorate, Damascus and the Golan.

North and east of the Golan Heights is the Al Quneitra governorate, mostly occupied by Israel in the Six Day War of 1967 and again in the Yom Kippur War of 1973. This part of Al Quneitra is known as the Israeli Golan Heights was formally annexed by Israel in 1981. The 1981 Israeli annexation received the approval of the U.S. Trump Administration fours years ago. To the east are the governorates of Dara'a and As Suweida, known in ancient biblical times as Bashan and referenced in last days Bible prophecy. The Rif Dimashq governorate completely surrounds the doomed city of Damascus. Even though all of Syria will cease to exist following the fulfillment of Isaiah 17, it is these highlighted regions will will bear the brunt of the coming hostilities. And to the West of Rif Dimashq is Lebanon, the critical stronghold of the Shi'a, Iran-aligned Hezbollah terrorist organization.

In the past five days, through the patient waiting for the observances in Israel to pass and the prospect of IDF action against terrorists on all sides, the Lord has led to another critical prophecy concerning the coming days which severely impacts the whole of the region. Not previously refenced on Eschatology Today, the prophecy of Zechariah 11:1-3 is as relevant as Isaiah 17, Joshua 13, Psalm 83, Isaiah 11 and Ezekiel 28. 

Elsewhere in Syria, and mostly in the skies above, are the increasingly belligerent actions of the remaining Russian Air Force contingent flying out of Hmeimim Air Base. The U.S. Air Forces CENTCOM commander, Lt. Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, has warning of the Russian AF pilots deliberately and repeatedly trying to provoke dogfight combat with US and Coalition fighter aircraft in the skies over Syria. General Grynkewich's directive to U.S. and Coalition pilots when they detect the Russian aggressive mid-air maneuvers is "don't take the bait." New rules of engagement (ROE) are almost certainly now in place and consummate with the risks present.

Therefore, the risk of a miscalculation or a direct attempt to shoot down one of our fighters over Syria increases with each sortie flown. The Russian commanders acknowledge this new reality saying that the previously agreed to deconfliction protocols no longer apply. This new reality is a direct the result of NATO's support of Ukraine and which Russia's views as a NATO war against Russia.

FINAL UPDATE 30 April 2023: For those interested, the final update to SITREP B3-23 features a clickable map of Syria as it exists today. It is hoped this map will bring home the tenuousness of the Bashar al-Assad's Syrian regime and the ultimate reason for its demise as foretold in Isaiah 17 and Jeremiah 49:23-27. 

As the title of this map indicates, Syria as a country is a rump version of what it had been prior to 2010-11 and the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War. As we have often heard of late, a country that does not control its borders will soon cease to be a country. It is also instructive to compare this map with the map of Rif Dimashq just above. 

And make note of the internal division of the country that is the Euphrates River. The government forces control only the northern third of the west bank of the Euphrates, from Manbij to Raqqa. The remainder of the southern west bank is under the control of the IRGC and proxy Shi'a forces to Abu Kamal. The entire east bank of the Euphrates River, from the Turkish border Abu Kamal is controlled by the SDF and the U.S.-led international coalition known as Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR). 

The U.S. also has control of a vast area around the At Tanf desert town straddling the Iraqi and Jordanian borders to approximately 55 miles in to Syria. In this position the U.S. forces are in the rear areas of Iranian and Hezbollah forces, and thereby protect Israel along the Golan Heights front. At any time in full-scale conflict the OIF forces could sever the IRGC and proxy forces access to Syria and its major supply lines along the Euphrates from Baghdad, Iraq to Abu Kamal, Syria. The whole of Lebanon and western Syria would in such circumstance be Israel's for the taking, up to the west bank of the Euphrates River, just as Bible prophecy foretells.