Two civilians were wounded after Israeli forces opened fire on local residents in Bir Ajam village in Syria's southern Quneitra province on Monday, according to Syrian media and monitoring groups. The incident was reported on Tuesday, 10 November, and is the latest in a series of Israeli ground incursions into southern Syria since the fall of the Assad government.

Al-Ikhbariyah Syria television, citing local sources, reported that Israeli troops entered the village of Bir Ajam on Monday and fired shots at local residents. A young man was wounded as a result. Separately, another civilian was wounded by Israeli fire while herding sheep west of the village, according to the same report.

Journalists also came under fire

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group, reported the same incidents under the heading of Israeli gunfire in al-Quneitra, describing journalists targeted and a shepherd wounded in separate incidents. Reports of the episode say a SANA correspondent and a Quneitra media team covering the incursion also came under fire, although no injuries were reported among the journalists.

The Syrian Journalists' Union demanded an independent international investigation into the firing on the media team, according to reports of the incident. The Observatory also reported on Tuesday that five Israeli military vehicles had entered Jbata al-Khashab in rural Quneitra and set up a checkpoint, in a further sign of the continuing ground activity in the area.

A pattern of incursions

Israeli ground incursions into southern Syria have continued since the collapse of the government of former President Bashar al-Assad in December 2024. Following the fall of Assad's government, the Israeli military seized control of a United Nations-patrolled buffer zone in southern Syria and has occupied it since, while also carrying out airstrikes against military facilities, installations and ammunition depots previously controlled by the Syrian armed forces.

According to Press TV, Israeli military strikes have mainly focused on the southern Syrian provinces of Quneitra, Daraa and Damascus, which account for about 80 percent of all recorded Israeli attacks. Israeli forces have repeatedly carried out incursions in rural areas of Quneitra and Daraa, including setting up temporary checkpoints, searching homes, detaining civilians and bulldozing agricultural land.

The incursions have continued despite a high-level diplomatic meeting in Jordan in August involving Asaad al-Shaibani, Syria's foreign minister, and Roman Gofman, the head of the Israeli Mossad spy agency. That meeting did not produce a public agreement on the Israeli military presence in southern Syria.

What is not yet known

The reports of Monday's incident did not give details of the condition of the two wounded civilians, and their names were not published. The reports also did not include an immediate public response from the Israeli military.

Quneitra province borders the occupied Golan Heights, and its villages have been among the most affected by the repeated Israeli patrols and checkpoints of the past year. For residents, the Bir Ajam incident is part of a wider pattern in which farming, herding and travel near the buffer zone have become increasingly dangerous, even as Damascus says it does not seek a conflict with Israel and has called for Israeli forces to withdraw.