Above: an Israeli armoured vehicle crosses the security fence into the so-called Alpha Line that separates the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights from Syria, in the town of Majdal Shams, December 8, 2024<\/p>\n
Israel has \u201cseized\u201d territory in Syrian-controlled areas of the Golan Heights, as its military warned Syrians living in five villages close to the Israeli-occupied portion of the strategic area to \u201cstay home\u201d.<\/p>\n
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he ordered Israeli forces to grab a buffer zone in the Golan Heights established by a 1974 ceasefire agreement with Syria, after a lightning advance by Syrian opposition forces ended Bashar al-Assad\u2019s rule<\/a>.<\/p>\n Netanyahu said<\/a> on Sunday that the decades-old agreement had collapsed and that Syrian soldiers had abandoned their positions, necessitating the Israeli takeover.<\/p>\n \u201cWe will not allow any hostile force to establish itself on our border,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Israel captured a portion of the Golan Heights<\/a> in the 1967 war and annexed it. The international community, except for the United States, views it as illegally occupied Syrian territory.<\/p>\n After Netanyahu\u2019s comments, the Israeli military issued an \u201curgent warning\u201d to Syrians living in Ofaniya, Quneitra, al-Hamidiyah, Samdaniya al-Gharbiyya and al-Qahtaniyah \u2013 all close to the Israeli-occupied portion of the Golan Heights.<\/p>\n \u201cThe fighting in your area is forcing the IDF [Israeli military] to act and we do not intend to harm you,\u201d Colonel Avichay Adraee, the Israeli army\u2019s Arabic-language spokesman, said on social media.<\/p>\n Agricultural areas in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights were declared closed military zones and some schools shifted to online classes in anticipation of unrest.<\/p>\n Syrians poured into the streets<\/a> echoing with celebratory gunfire on Sunday after a stunning opposition advance reached the capital of Damascus, putting an end to the al-Assad family\u2019s 50 years of iron rule but raising questions about the future of the country and the wider region.<\/p>\n 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.<\/p>\n