Israeli forces have established themselves on an abandoned Syrian military base in the village of Maariyah and prevented farmers from accessing their fields, residents said Thursday.
Posted at 2:18 p.m.
Ghaith Alsayed et Hussein Malla
Associated Press
Associated Press journalists who visited the area saw Israeli troops from a distance and saw a villager waving a white flag as he approached to speak to them.
The village, on the western edge of Daraa governorate in southern Syria, is near the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights but outside a Golan buffer zone established by a ceasefire agreement. the 1974 fire between Syria and Israel.
Abdel Raouf Issa, a resident of Maariyah, said the Israeli army had penetrated about 1 kilometer into the village and “demanded that we hand over all weapons to the occupation.”
“We told them we didn’t have any weapons. They stopped us from farming. They stopped us from moving, he said. We call on the United Nations to end the occupation as soon as possible. »
PHOTO MATIAS DELACROIX, ASSOCIATED PRESS
Israeli troops near the “Alpha Line”, which separates the Israeli-occupied Golan from Syria.
Kamal Saleh Damara, a local village official, said: “Thank God, we were happy that HTC came,” referring to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the main insurgent group in the coalition that toppled Assad. “But then Israel came and stopped people from coming and going and moving around. »
Since the Six Day War
The Israeli military said in a statement that it “operates in the buffer zone and several other locations nearby to ensure the security of Israel’s northern border.” She declined to comment on the precise locations where her troops are deployed.
Israel took control of part of southern Syria, along the border with the Golan Heights annexed by Israel, shortly after the overthrow of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad by rebels on December 8.
The capture of the buffer zone, a demilitarized area of around 400 square kilometers in Syrian territory, has drawn condemnation, with critics accusing Israel of violating a 1974 ceasefire and exploiting the chaos in Syria after the ouster of Assad to seize land.
Israel seized control of the Golan Heights from Syria in the 1967 Six-Day War and later annexed it – a move not recognized by most countries in the international community.
On Wednesday, a group of residents and dignitaries from the buffer zone of Qouneitra governorate issued a statement complaining that Israeli forces had forcibly displaced residents from some villages even though they “showed restraint towards the forces that advanced and did not resist them. However, they said some residents were allowed to return later.
The statement called on Israeli forces to withdraw “particularly from vital installations, such as the Quneitra provincial government building, main roads and water wells and reservoirs serving the area.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday that Israeli forces will remain in place until another arrangement is put in place “that guarantees Israel’s security.” He made the comments from the summit of Mount Hermon – the highest peak in the region – in Syria, about 10 km from the border with the Golan Heights.
