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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told journalists on Monday evening local time that Israel had destroyed in 14 months what it had taken Iran 45 years to build: a network of terrorist groups on the borders of the Jewish state.

Netanyahu was speaking in the aftermath of the sudden defeat of the Syrian regime by rebel forces, who moved with lightning speed to Damascus in the wake of Israel’s success in a war of self-defense against Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Iran had armed and funded Hezbollah, using the force not only to threaten and attack Israel, but also to dominate Lebanese politics, and to serve as the shock troops of the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad against Sunni militias.

Iran also controlled Hamas, which was originally a Sunni group but came to rely on the Shiite regime for weapons, arms, training, and other forms of support.

Israel has decimated Hezbollah and largely destroyed Hamas in Gaza.

Iran still has proxy militias in Iraq that fire missiles and drones sporadically at Israel, and it also controls the Houthi rebels in Yemen, who hit Israel with a drone on Monday. Iran is also smuggling weapons to terrorists in Judea and Samaria, otherwise known as the West Bank, in an effort to destabilize the Palestinian Authority as well as Israel.

Netanyahu spoke of a new beginning in the Middle East, and reiterated that he wanted good relations with Syria. In the interim, he confirmed, Israeli forces would operate in the formerly demilitarized zone between Israel and Syria, as well as on the peak of Mount Hermon, the highest mountain in the region, which was formerly a Syrian military site.

He stressed the strategic importance of the Golan Heights, which are a crucial buffer between the chaos in Syria and the Israeli heartland. He reminded the press that he had urged U.S. President Donald Trump to recognize Israeli sovereignty over the territory, which Israel took from Syria in the defensive war of 1967, after nearly two decades in which Syrians had been able to use the Heights to shell Israeli farms and communities in the Galilee valley below.

The Israeli prime minister also emphasized the suffering of the 100 hostages still in Hamas captivity in Gaza, and said that the collapse of Iran’s terrorist proxies, as well as Iran’s own weakness, would push Hamas towards making a deal.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Agenda: What Trump Should Do in His First 100 Days, available for pre-order on Amazon. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

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