Russia will deploy military police on the Golan Heights frontier between Syria and Israel and set up eight observation posts, Interfax news agency reported, citing the Russian Defence Ministry, and according to reuters.com.

“With the aim of preventing possible provocations against UN posts along the ‘Bravo’ line, the deployment is planned of eight observation posts of Russia’s armed forces’ military police,” Sergei Rudskoi, a senior Defence Ministry official was quoted as saying by Interfax.

Syrian forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad and their Russian and Iranian allies have largely defeated anti-government rebels in south-west Syria, bringing pro-government forces closer to the frontier with Israel.

The prospect that Iranian forces, and members of the Shi’ite Hezbollah militia, are in proximity with the border in the area of the Golan Heights has prompted warnings from Israel, which sees Iran as a threat to its national security.

Iranian forces have withdrawn their heavy weapons in Syria to a distance of 85 km (53 miles) from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, TASS quoted a Russian envoy as saying on Wednesday, but Israel deemed the pullback inadequate.

Rudskoi was also quoted as saying that a UN peacekeeping force on the Golan Heights between Israel and Syria that was stopped in 2012 could be resumed.

UN peacekeepers accompanied by Russian military police patrolled the area for the first time in six years on Thursday, Rudskoi said.

Four Islamic militants were killed in a violent clash in the Skikda region, some 260 miles east of the capital city of Algiers, Algeria’s defense ministry said.

Meanwhile, local police and a military official in Algiers said seven soldiers were also killed in the skirmish that occurred Monday in the locality of Bessi during a search and sweep operation.

The police and military sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity as they weren’t authorized to speak publicly to journalists, said the dead soldiers’ bodies were taken to the local morgue and several other wounded soldiers were treated in the Skikda hospital.

The ministry confirmed the “elimination” of four “terrorists” in which the military recovered three machine guns — but did not comment on the soldiers’ deaths.

The Skikda region was a former stronghold of armed groups during the 1990s and is known for its mountainous and wooded terrain. It has not seen militant violence in several years.

Egyptian security forces killed five terrorists and arrested five more after clashes erupted in Al-Qalyubia and Cairo provinces, the country’s interior ministry announced on Wednesday, Saudi state-news channel Al-Ekhbariya reported.

The terrorists were identified as being part of the “Hams” group, known for plotting attacks across the country, the ministry’s statement read.

The statement added that a large number of military-grade weapons and ammunition was seized by the security forces.

Three glaring inaccuracies appeared in the Syrian claim on Tuesday, July 31, that its army had won control of the entire border with Israel, which failed to credit Hizballah and pro-Iranian Shiites, like reported by debka.com.

1. Hizballah and Shiite militias commanded by Iranian Revolutionary Guards officers, in fact, fought the winning battle for the Syrian-Israeli border regions – not the Syrian army’s 4^th
2. “The Syria Special Forces” credited with the feat is a euphemism for “The Local Defense Forces” – itself a code-word for a Shiite unit run by Hizballah officers and local mercenaries in Hizballah’s pay. Its commander does not take its orders from the Syrian general command, but directly from Iranian Revolutionary Guards centers in Syria. Israeli military sources disclose that, by now, these “Local Defense Forces” have set up headquarters in the Quneitra region at Tel Mashara and Mashara the town.
   An Israeli officer relayed a hurried request through IDF channels to the Russian command in Khmeimim, as them to protect the population which had fallen under Syrian-Iranian-Hizballah control after being long allied with and aided by Israel. This request to save lives was not only belated, but futile. The Russians, having abetted the Syrian/Iranian conquest of southwestern Syria, are now gone from the area. President Vladimir Putin and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu have therefore reneged on their reiterated pledge to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to appoint a Russian officer at the head of the Syrian units entering the border regions as a guarantee that pro-Iranian elements would not move in with them. This was the last of a row of commitments which the Russians failed to uphold.
   Going by past instances, the incoming Syrian “special forces” will now start a process of “selection” to establish which parts of the population collaborated with Israel. We we will soon start hearing about mass executions.
3. The battle for the Yarmuk valley is not over, as the Syrians maintain. True, the roughly one thousand Khalid bin Walid Army fighters loyal to the Islamic State have no chance against the onslaught mounted on them in the last corner of the border. But for now, they are still holding out in 50 sq.km of the pocket that controls the Syrian-Israeli-Jordanian border intersection, They are also armed with Grad ground-to-ground rockets, two of which landed in the Sea of Galilee on July 25.

So what happened to the solemn promises never to allow pro-Iranian and Hizballah forces to reach the Israeli border and certainly not to set up bases in Syria, that were heard week after week from Israel’s top leaders, such as the prime minister, the defense minister Avigdor Lieberman, senior cabinet ministers Naftali Bennett and Yoav Galant and the IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gady Eisenkot? The new photo attached to this article clearly attests to those hostile forces already sitting on fences within sight of the IDF’s positions on the Golan border.

Egyptian security forces have killed 11 militants in a shootout in al-Arish, the capital of North Sinai province, state news agency MENA reported on Wednesday, as authorities pushed ahead with an operation to crush Islamic State.

The shootout occurred during a raid on a suspected militant hideout in an abandoned house in al-Arish, MENA said, citing an un-named security source. Three machine guns and a rifle were found at the hideout, MENA said.

The report did not mention any casualties or wounded among the security forces.

Interior ministry officials were not immediately available to comment on the report.

Egypt in February launched a highly-publicized operation against Islamic State militants who have waged years of attacks on security forces and civilians, killing hundreds.

The death of the 11 brings the total of those killed since the beginning of the operation to at least 261 suspected militants, according to a Reuters count based on military statements. At least 35 military personnel have also been killed since February, according to a Reuters count based on military statements.

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi ordered the armed forces in November to defeat militants within three months after an attack on a mosque in Sinai killed more than 300 people.

Defeating Islamists and restoring security after years of unrest has been a promise of Sisi, who was re-elected in March in a landslide victory against no real opposition.

Sisi’s critics say his presidency has brought a harsh crackdown on dissent, but supporters say such measures are needed to stabilize Egypt, which was rocked by years of unrest after protests toppled veteran leader Hosni Mubarak in 2011.

Libya National Army (LNA) led by Gen. Khalifa Haftar, surrounded a group of Islamic State terrorists near central Jufra district.

According to the eastern-based Libyan news agency, the army’s oil fields security operation chamber revealed it was surrounding an IS group who attacked an oil field near Jufra, some 650 km southeast of the capital Tripoli.

The operation chamber announced state of alert after receiving information about a mobilization of IS militants in an area far from the oil fields.

Jufra district is located in central Libya and consists of five small towns. It also contains Zalla basin, an important area with a number of major oil fields.

“The armed forces of the operation chamber are fully prepared and ready to face any threat or attack on the area and the surrounding fields,” said Col. Yousef Abdulgader Saeed, commander of the operation chamber.

IS affiliates are mostly active in the areas surrounding Jufra all the way to southern Libya due to the nature of rugged desert.

In the past few years, IS terrorists have launched a number of attacks on oil fields in Zalla basin.

Israel will form a special task force to combat ‎Palestinian arson terrorism that has been wreaking ‎havoc on Israeli communities adjacent to the Israel-‎Gaza Strip border, like reported by israelhayom.com.‎

Fire and Rescue Commissioner David Simchi announced ‎the move on Sunday, saying the task force would be ‎exclusively responsible for dealing with fires ‎sparked by incendiary kites and firebomb balloons ‎sent over the border. ‎

Palestinian kite terrorism, which has been ravaging ‎‎Gaza-vicinity communities since late April, ‎has so ‎‎far sparked ‎‎860 fires. Over 8,000 acres of ‎forest ‎‎and ‎‎‎agricultural ‎‎land ‎on the Israeli side of ‎the ‎‎border have been decimated, causing millions of ‎‎dollars ‎in damage. ‎

‎The Nature and Parks Authority said the fires have ‎‎destroyed 25% of all nature reserves near the ‎‎border. The damage to the area’s flora and fauna ‎‎will ‎take years to rehabilitate, it said. ‎

The decision to establish the task force was made ‎over the relentless nature of the kite campaign, ‎which Hamas – the terrorist group that rules Gaza – ‎refuses to curtail.‎

If anything, Hamas operatives have been trying to ‎upgrade the kites to fly deeper into Israeli ‎territory.‎

Fire and Rescue Services data indicates that there ‎are five points along the 60-kilometer (37-mile) ‎border between Gaza and Israel from where terrorists ‎fly incendiary devices. ‎

While fires near the border rage daily, the data ‎also shows a decrease in the overall number of major ‎blazes, which the Fire and Rescue Services attributes ‎to the firefighters’ readiness on the ground as ‎well as to the fact that, given the devastation in ‎the area, new fires have fewer areas into which they ‎can spread.‎

‎”The new task force will adapt to the dynamic nature ‎of operations on the ground and will allow the teams ‎currently deployed near the Gaza border to return to ‎their normal missions,” Simchi ‎said Sunday. ‎

He noted that the task force will also coordinate ‎wide-scale missions with the IDF, Israel Police, ‎Jewish National Fund, Nature and Parks Authority and ‎the heads of the local communities.‎

The border-vicinity area will be split into two ‎sectors. Large firefighting teams will be assigned ‎to each sector and they will have a variety of ‎advanced measures at their disposal, including all-terrain vehicles and motorcycles recently purchased ‎by the Public Security Ministry. ‎

The new vehicles are equipped with special gear to ‎carry water and flame retarding agents and are meant to be used as a first ‎response ahead of the firefighters’ arrival at the ‎scene. ‎