QUNEITRA, Syria (AP) — A main road in the provincial capital of Quneitra in southern Syria was blocked with mounds of dirt, fallen palm trees and a metal pole that appeared to have once been a traffic light. On the other side of the barriers, an Israeli tank could be seen maneuvering in the middle of the street.
Israeli forces entered the area — which lies in a U.N.-patrolled buffer zone in the Golan Heights that was established by a 1974 ceasefire agreement between Syria and Israel — soon after the fall of President Bashar Assad last month in the country's 13-year civil war.
The Israeli military has also made incursions into Syrian territory outside of the buffer zone, sparking protests by local residents. They said the Israeli forces have demolished homes and prevented farmers from going to their fields in some areas. On at least two occasions, Israeli troops reportedly opened fired on protesters who approached them.
Residents of Quneitra, a seemingly serene bucolic expanse of small villages and olive groves, said they are frustrated, both by the Israeli advances and by the lack of action from Syria’s new authorities and the international community.
Rinata Fastas said that Israeli forces raided local government buildings but had not so far entered residential neighborhoods. Her house lies just inside of the newly blocked-off area in the provincial capital formerly called Baath City, after Assad's former ruling party, and now renamed Salam City.
She said she is afraid Israeli troops may advance farther or try to permanently occupy the area they have already taken. Israel still controls the Golan Heights, a strategic plateau overlooking northern Israel that it captured from Syria during the 1967 Mideast war and later annexed. The international community, with the exception of the U.S., regards it as occupied.
Fastas said she understands that Syria, which is now trying to build its national institutions and army from scratch, is in no position to militarily confront Israel.
“But why is no one in the new Syrian state coming out and talking about the violations that are happening in Quneitra province and against the rights of its people?” she asked.
Syria's new rulers are in no rush to confront Israel
Israel describes its activity in Syria as defensive and temporary. Officials point to the presence of Iranian-backed forces in Syria before Assad was ousted, and say they want to prevent a cross-border incursion like the Hamas-led attack that triggered the war in Gaza.
They are also wary of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the Islamist former insurgent group that is now the dominant faction in Syria's new administration and which previously had ties to al-Qaida, although it has renounced them.
Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Saar, recently called Syria’s new leadership a “terrorist gang” and claimed that many countries wanted to recognize the new Syrian government only in order to send their Syrian refugees home.
The United Nations has accused Israel of violating the 1974 ceasefire agreement by entering the buffer zone. The Israeli army said in a statement that it “remains committed to the principles” of the agreement.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said troops will stay in Syria "until another arrangement is found that will ensure Israel’s security.” He was speaking from the snowy peak of Mount Hermon, Syria’s tallest mountain known as Jabal al Sheikh in Arabic, which has now been captured by Israeli forces.
The new Syrian government has lodged a complaint with the U.N. Security Council about Israeli airstrikes and advances into Syrian territory.
But the issue does not appear to be a priority for Syria’s new rulers as they try to consolidate control over the country, turn a patchwork of former rebel factions into a new national army, and push for the removal of Western sanctions.
The country’s new de facto leader, Ahmad al-Sharaa, head of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, has also publicly said Syria is not seeking a military conflict with Israel and will not pose a threat to its neighbors or to the West.
In the meantime, residents of Quneitra have largely been left to fend for themselves.
In the village of Rafid, inside the buffer zone, locals said the Israeli military had demolished two civilian houses and a grove of trees as well as a former Syrian army outpost.
Mayor Omar Mahmoud Ismail said when the Israeli forces entered the village, an Israeli officer greeted him and told him, “I am your friend.”
“I told him, ‘You are not my friend, and if you were, you wouldn’t enter like this,’" Ismail said.
Locals who organized a protest were met with Israeli fire
In Dawaya, a village outside the buffer zone, 18-year-old Abdelrahman Khaled al-Aqqa was lying on a mattress in his family home Sunday, still recovering after being shot in both legs. Al-Aqqa said he joined about 100 people from the area on Dec. 25 in protest against the Israeli incursion, chanting “Syria is free, Israel get out!”
“We didn’t have any weapons, we were just there in the clothes we were wearing,” he said. “But when we got close to them, they started shooting at us.”
Six protesters were wounded, according to residents and media reports. Another man was injured on Dec. 20 in a similar incident in the village of Maariyah. The Israeli army said at the time that it had fired because the man was quickly approaching and ignored calls to stop.
Regarding the Dec. 25 incident, the Israeli military said its forces had fired “warning shots solely aimed at the air” after the crowd did not heed a call to stand back.
In the village of Swisah, Adel Subhi al-Ali, a local Sunni religious official, sat with his 21-year-old son, Moutasem, who was recovering after being shot in the stomach in the Dec. 25 protest. He was driven first to a local hospital that did not have the capacity to treat him, and then to Damascus where he underwent surgery.
When he saw the Israeli tanks moving in, “We felt that an occupation is occupying our land. So we had to defend it, even though we didn’t have weapons, ... It is impossible for them to settle here,” al-Ali said.
Since the day of the protest, the Israeli army has not returned to the area, he said.
Al-Ali called for the international community to “pressure Israel to return to what was agreed upon with the former regime,” referring to the 1974 ceasefire agreement, and to return the Golan Heights to Syria.
But he acknowledged that Syria has little leverage.
“We are starting from zero, we need to build a state,” al-Ali said, echoing Syria's new leaders. “We are not ready as a country now to open wars with another country."
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Associated Press writer Josef Federman in Jerusalem contributed to this report.
