Zidan Mashour, a Druze resident of the Syrian Golan Heights village of Hader, was driving July 22 near the town of Quneitra when his car exploded and he was killed instantly. A missile fired from an unmanned aircraft reportedly hit his car. The killing was attributed to Israel, which did not take responsibility for the attack.

According to Syrian media reports, Mashour was a key activist in the “Golan File,” a covert Hezbollah operation to establish a frontline base against Israel on the Golan Heights that Israel exposed this past March. His job was to recruit local residents for a secret militia being established by Hezbollah along the border with Israel. The militia was tasked with storing weapons, explosives and anti-tank missiles for the Shiite organization, familiarizing itself with the border and readying for the day when Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah opens a new front against Israel. According to the “Golan File,” Hezbollah’s militia is mostly local mercenaries. It is reportedly led by Hezbollah operative Ali Moussa Daqduq (nicknamed Abu Hassan Sajad). This unit is supposed to collect intelligence information, identify Israeli weak points, monitor the movement and SOPs of the Israeli military units deployed along the border and entrench Hezbollah in the arena.

This is the same type of activity that was led a few years ago by Jihad Mughniyah, the son of one of the Hezbollah founders Imad Mughniyah, and subsequently by Samir Kuntar. Both were killed in mysterious 2015 assassinations in Syria. Hezbollah has always aspired to establish a frontline base on the Syrian Golan, thereby expanding its Lebanon-based front against Israel. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was adamantly opposed to the plan, according to Western intelligence sources. However, after Iran and its Hezbollah allies saved Assad’s regime during the Syrian civil war, he has lifted his veto on the militia’s entrenchment in the Golan. Assad is not involved, not interested and, according to some assessments, is not familiar with Hezbollah’s operations on the Golan. His attention is focused on the final rebel holdout in northern Syria and in the complex battles by his army to take the Idlib enclave. Nasrallah, according to Israeli intelligence, has free rein in the Syrian Golan.

Israel exposed the “Golan File” in order to deter Nasrallah and try to convince Hezbollah to drop the idea, but it failed. Hezbollah continued to establish a military option for itself on the Golan, according to Israeli intelligence. “Currently they are putting together their force,” a senior Israeli military source told Al-Monitor in March, when the covert Hezbollah operation was revealed. “We do not intend to let this happen. We will not allow Hezbollah to extend its front with Israel to the Syrian Golan, too. It will not happen.”