Golan Heights braces for more
fighting By Jillian
Kestler-D'Amours
MAJDAL SHAMS, Occupied
Golan Heights - After Israeli war planes
reportedly bombed targets in Syrian territory last
week, individuals and groups in the
Israeli-occupied Golan Heights are quietly
preparing for the possibility of escalating
violence between Syria and Israel.
"We can
feel that the presence of the Israeli army in the
Golan has been increasing in the last week. People
started to prepare for a war situation," said Dr
Taiseer Maray, director general of the local group
Golan for the Development of the Arab Villages.
Israeli security sources reported this
week that an Iron Dome missile defense system had
been placed on Israel's northern border with Syria
and Lebanon. The move came less than a week after
Israeli jets were suspected to have bombed a weapons
convoy inside Syria, near
the Lebanese border.
Media reports
speculated that the weapons were destined for
Lebanese resistance group Hezbollah, which fought
a month-long war with Israel in 2006. The Syrian
government, however, said a scientific research
Centrex on the outskirts of Damascus was the
target of the Israeli raid.
Syrian
officials accused Israel of trying to
"destabilize" Syria. They also used the Israeli
attack to discredit the opposition movement in
Syria, arguing it proved that external forces are
responsible for the ongoing uprising against
President Bashar al-Assad.
While Israel
hasn't formally taken responsibility for the
bombing, defense minister Ehud Barak said the
strike was "proof that when we say something we
mean it. We don't think [Syria] should be allowed
to bring advanced weapons systems into Lebanon."
Fighting between the Syrian army and
Syrian resistance groups aiming to oust President
Assad has left over 60,000 Syrians dead and forced
up to one million people to flee as refugees to
neighboring countries, the United Nations
estimates.
According to Maray, as Israel
increasingly threatens to become involved
militarily in the conflict, preparations for
emergency field clinics in the Golan Heights, and
across the Israel-Syria ceasefire line are now
being planned, should Israel occupy more Syrian
land.
"Any kind of fighting, or any
movement of [the Israeli] army, will be via the
Golan Heights. This makes the Golan a really
sensitive area. We try to prepare the shelters. We
try to keep more food in our houses, just to be
ready for such a possibility," Maray told IPS from
his office in Majdal Shams, the largest
Syrian-Arab village in the area.
In 1967,
Israel occupied the Golan Heights, a mountainous
region and fertile plateau bordered by Lebanon,
Jordan and northern Israel. Israel annexed the
Golan in 1981 and extended its laws to the
territory in a move that is considered illegal by
the international community.
About 20,000
Syrian Arabs live in a handful of communities in
the Golan Heights, including the largest and
northernmost village, Majdal Shams, which lies
only 60 kilometers from Damascus.
Most
Syrian-Arab residents of the Golan are members of
the Druze religious minority. Today, community
members hold Israeli ID cards and are considered
permanent residents of Israel.
Since the
Syrian uprising began, Golan residents have been
divided between supporting the Assad government
and supporting the opposition movement. In Majdal
Shams, physical violence has erupted between the
two sides.
"I think every day Assad is
losing popularity. It's not politics. What's
taking place in Syria became a very basic
humanitarian thing: people have the right to
life," said Salman Falkredeen, an activist at
Al-Marsad, a human rights center in Majdal Shams.
Speaking from the Al-Marsad office, as the
sound of bombs went off in the distance just over
the hills of southwestern Syria, Falkredeen said
the Syrian uprising has amplified local demands
for the end of the ongoing Israeli occupation of
the Golan Heights.
"It sharpened the
conflict [with Israel] more and more. People began
discussing or raising the issue of freedom,"
Falkredeen told IPS. "The demand of democracy, the
awareness of human rights values, these are new
questions that people are asking all the time.
People are changing their ideas and their
behavior."
He added that while the Syrian
revolution has had minor, direct impact on the
lives of the people in the Golan Heights - young
people were barred from studying in Syria, and
farmers were unable to market their apples in
Damascus, for example - it will have a lasting
effect on political consciousness.
"All
Syrians will have political experience through the
revolution because before that, there was no
opportunity for Syrians to develop politics. Under
the Assads, Bashar and his father [Hafez], there
was no politics. We had a political desert in
Syria, but in the last two years, it was a huge
school of politics. We are learning in the most
painful and hard way."
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