Israel agreed to double its population on the occupied Golan Heights while saying threats from Syria remained despite the moderate tone of rebel leaders who ousted President Bashar al-Assad a week ago.

“Strengthening the Golan is strengthening the State of Israel, and it is especially important at this time. We will continue to hold onto it, cause it to blossom, and settle in it,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement.

Israel captured most of the strategic plateau from Syria in the 1967 Six-Day War, annexing it in 1981.

In 2019 then-President Donald Trump declared U.S. support for Israeli sovereignty over the Golan, but the annexation has not been recognised by most countries. Syria demands Israel withdraw but Israel refuses, citing security concerns. Various peace efforts have failed.

What is the Golan Heights and what does it mean to Israel and Syria?

WHY IS THE AREA CONTENTIOUS?

The Golan Heights were part of Syria until 1967, when Israel captured most of the plateau in the Six-Day War, occupying it and annexing it unilaterally in 1981. That annexation was not recognised by most countries. Syria still holds part of the Golan and has demanded that Israel withdraw from the rest of it. Israel has refused, citing security concerns.

Syria tried to regain the Golan in the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, but was thwarted. Israel and Syria signed an armistice in 1974 and the Golan has been relatively quiet since.
In 2000 Israel and Syria held their highest-level talks over a possible return of the Golan and a peace agreement. But the negotiations collapsed and subsequent talks also failed.
During US President-elect Donald Trump’s first term in 2019, he declared US support for Israeli sovereignty over the Golan. The dramatic shift reflected Trump’s decision in 2017 to recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and move the US Embassy to the city, which delighted Israel but infuriated Palestinians and many Arab political and religious leaders.

WHY DOES ISRAEL WANT THE GOLAN?

Security. Israel said earlier in Syria’s more than decade-long civil war that it demonstrated the need to keep the plateau as a buffer zone between Israeli towns and the instability of its neighbour.

Israel’s government also voiced concern that Iran, a longtime ally of the Assad regime, was trying to cement its presence on Syria’s side of the border in order to launch attacks on Israel. Israel frequently bombed suspected Iranian military assets in Syria in the years leading up to Assad’s fall.

WHO LIVES THERE?

Some 55,000 people live on the Israeli-occupied Golan, about 24,000 of them Druze, an Arab minority who practice an offshoot of Islam, according to analyst Avraham Levine of the Alma Research and Education Center specialising in Israel’s security challenges on its northern border. Many of the Druze adherents in Syria were long loyal to the Assad regime. Many families have members on both sides of the demarcation line.

After annexing the Golan, Israel gave the Druze the option of citizenship, but most rejected it and still identify as Syrian. Another 31,000 Israelis have settled there, Levine said. Many of them work in farming, including vineyards, and tourism.

WHO CONTROLS THE SYRIAN SIDE OF THE GOLAN?

Before the outbreak of Syria’s civil war in 2011, there was an uneasy stand-off between Israeli and Syrian forces.
But in 2014 anti-government Islamist rebels overran Quneitra province on the Syrian side. The rebels forced Assad’s forces to withdraw and also turned on U.N. forces in the area, forcing them to pull back from some of their positions.
The area remained under rebel control until the summer of 2018, when Assad’s forces returned to the largely ruined city of Quneitra and the surrounding area following a Russian-backed offensive and a deal that allowed rebels to withdraw.

WHAT SEPARATES THE TWO SIDES ON THE GOLAN?

A United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) is stationed in camps and observation posts along the Golan, supported by military observers of the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization (UNTSO).
Between the Israeli and Syrian armies is a 400-square-km (155-square-mile) “Area of Separation” – often called a demilitarised zone – in which the two countries’ armed forces are not permitted under the ceasefire arrangement.
The Separation of Forces Agreement of May 31, 1974, created an Alpha Line to the west of the area of separation, behind which Israeli military forces must remain, and a Bravo Line to the east behind which Syrian military forces must remain.
Extending 25 km (15 miles) beyond the “Area of Separation” on both sides is an “Area of Limitation” in which there are restrictions on the number of troops and number and kinds of weapons that both sides can have there.
There is one crossing point between the Israeli and Syrian sides, which until the Syrian civil war began was used mainly by United Nations forces, a limited number of Druze civilians and for the transport of agricultural produce.

Netanyahu said he spoke with Trump on Saturday about security developments in Syria.

“We have no interest in a conflict with Syria,” Netanyahu said in a statement. Israeli actions in Syria were intended to “thwart the potential threats from Syria and to prevent the takeover of terrorist elements near our border,” he added.

Defence Minister Israel Katz said in a statement that the latest developments in Syria increased the threat to Israel, “despite the moderate image that the rebel leaders claim to present”.

Netanyahu’s office said the government unanimously approved a more than 40-million-shekel ($11 million) plan to encourage demographic growth in the Golan.

It said Netanyahu submitted the plan to the government “in light of the war and the new front facing Syria, and out of a desire to double the population of the Golan”.

Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates condemned Israel’s decision, with the UAE – which normalised relations with Israel in 2020 – describing it as a “deliberate effort to expand the occupation”.

Some 31,000 Israelis have settled there, said analyst Avraham Levine of the Alma Research and Education Center specialising in Israel’s security challenges on its northern border. Many work in farming, including vineyards, and tourism. The Golan is home to 24,000 Druze, an Arab minority who practice an offshoot of Islam, Levine said. Most identify as Syrian.

AVOIDING ‘NEW CONFRONTATIONS’

Syria’s de facto leader, Ahmad al-Sharaa, said on Saturday that Israel was using false pretexts to justify its attacks on Syria, but he was not interested in engaging in new conflicts as his country focuses on rebuilding.

Sharaa – better known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani – leads the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group that swept Assad from power last Sunday, ending the family’s five-decade iron-fisted rule.

Since then Israel has moved into a demilitarised zone inside Syria that was created after the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, including the Syrian side of the strategic Mount Hermon that overlooks Damascus, where its forces took over an abandoned Syrian military post.

Israel, which has said that it does not intend to stay there and calls the incursion into Syrian territory a limited and temporary measure to ensure border security, has also carried out hundreds of strikes on Syria’s strategic weapons stockpiles.

It has said it is destroying weapons and military infrastructure to prevent them from being used by rebel groups that drove Assad from power, some of which grew from movements linked to al Qaeda and Islamic State.

Several Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Jordan, have condemned what they called Israel’s seizure of a buffer zone in the Golan Heights.

“Syria’s war-weary condition, after years of conflict and war, does not allow for new confrontations. The priority at this stage is reconstruction and stability, not being drawn into disputes that could lead to further destruction,” Sharaa said in an interview published on the website of Syria TV, a channel that sides with the rebels.

He also said diplomatic solutions were the only way to ensure security and stability and that “uncalculated military adventures” were not wanted.