Israel bolsters border security with Syria after Druze attacks

MAJDAL SHAMS: Israeli troops on Wednesday sought to control crowds and prevent Druze from crossing the border with Syria, after deadly violence in the country’s south that prompted Damascus to send in government forces.

Soldiers fired teargas to keep order, as dozens of people tried to cross the heavily fortified frontier, said an AFP reporter in Majdal Shams, a mainly Druze town in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

The Israeli military said in a statement it had identified “dozens of suspects attempting to infiltrate Israeli territory from the area of Hader in Syria”.

“(Israeli troops) and Israeli Border Police are operating to prevent the infiltration and disperse the gathering,” it added.

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“Simultaneously, several Israeli civilians crossed the border fence into Syrian territory in the area of Majdal Shams. (Israeli) troops are currently operating to safely return the civilians who crossed the border.”

Tensions have mounted after Syria’s government deployed troops to quell several days of unrest between Druze and Bedouin fighters in the Sweida area of southern Syria, which borders Israel.

Witnesses, Druze armed groups and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said Syrian troops took part in fighting with the Bedouin against the Druze, which Israel has vowed to protect.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in February that southern Syria must be completely demilitarised and that Israel would not accept the presence of Damascus’s Islamist-led government near its territory.

Some 153,000 Druze are Israeli citizens, living mainly in the north. In the Golan Heights, which Israel seized from Syria in 1967, more than 22,000 Druze hold permanent resident status, but maintain family ties inside Syria.

Only around 1,600 have taken up the offer of Israeli citizenship. The remainder maintain their Syrian identity.

The minority also accounts for about three percent of Syria’s population and is heavily concentrated in the southern province of Sweida.

On Wednesday, Netanyahu described the situation in Sweida as “very serious” and urged the Druze concerned by what was happening: “You are citizens of Israel. Do not cross the border.

“You are endangering your lives; you could be killed, you could be kidnapped, and you are harming the efforts of the (Israeli `tary),” he added.

The Israeli military, which announced the reinforcement of the border with more troops, said earlier it had hit the entrance of Syria’s military headquarters in Damascus.

Defence Minister Israel Katz said later that “the signals to Damascus are over – now come the painful blows”, sharing Syrian television footage of an explosion in Damascus on his X account.

He promised that troops would “operate forcefully in Sweida to eliminate the forces that attacked the Druze until their full withdrawal”.