The Israeli military said its forces shot a protester during a demonstration against the army's activities in a village in southern Syria, injuring him in the leg. Since Islamist-led rebels toppled Syrian president Bashar al-Assad on December 8 Israel has carried out hundreds of air strikes on Syrian military facilities in what it says is a bid to prevent them from falling into hostile hands. In a move widely condemned internationally, Israel also sent troops into a United Nations-patrolled buffer zone in the Golan Heights, and beyond, calling it a defensive and temporary measure. "During a protest against IDF's activities in the area of Maariya in southern Syria, IDF (Israeli military) called on protesters to distance themselves from the troops," the military told.

The village is just outside the southern point of the UN-patrolled zone. "After the troops identified a threat, they operated in accordance with standard operating procedures against the threat... The protester was shot in the leg," the military said. The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said the Israeli troops were stationed at a barracks in the village. "During a protest condemning the Israeli incursion, a young man was injured by Israeli forces' gunfire in the village of Maariya, in the Daraa region," the Observatory said.

Israeli forced from Al-Jazeera barracks "opened fire directly at the demonstrators," wounding the man in the leg, it said. A villager from Maariya told AFP that Israeli soldiers had been entering his village and other nearby villages in recent days. "When the Israelis entered ... they sowed fear and horror among the people, the children, the women," Ali al-Khalaf. "So much so that some people fled to other nearby villages. They (Israeli troops) entered the villages of Maariya, Aabdyn and Jamlah," he added. On Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a security briefing atop a strategic Syrian mountain inside the UN-patrolled zone.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan (INP)