Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he ordered Israeli forces to “seize” a buffer zone in the occupied Golan Heights established by a 1974 ceasefire agreement with Syria, after a lightning advance by Syrian opposition forces ended Bashar al-Assad’s rule.
Netanyahu said on Sunday that the decades-old agreement had collapsed and that Syrian soldiers had abandoned their positions, necessitating the Israeli takeover.
“We will not allow any hostile force to establish itself on our border,” he said.
Israel captured the Golan Heights in the 1967 war and annexed it. The international community, except for the United States, views it as occupied Syrian territory.
Agricultural areas in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights were declared closed military zones and some schools shifted to online classes in anticipation of unrest.
Syrians poured into the streets echoing with celebratory gunfire on Sunday after a stunning opposition advance reached the capital of Damascus, putting an end to the al-Assad family’s 50 years of iron rule but raising questions about the future of the country and the wider region.
Joyful crowds gathered in central squares in Damascus, waving the Syrian revolutionary flag in scenes that recalled the early days of the Arab Spring uprising, before a brutal crackdown and the rise of an armed uprising plunged the country into a nearly 14-year war.
Netanyahu hailed the removal of al-Assad on Sunday as an “historic day” that followed the blows delivered by Israel against al-Assad’s supporters Iran and Hezbollah in its recent war on Lebanon.
Credit: aljazeera.com
