An hour’s drive from Damascus, on a country road to the Syrian village of Hadar, we meet the Israeli army.
Two military vehicles and several soldiers in full combat gear man a makeshift checkpoint: a foreign authority in a country celebrating its freedom. They waved us through.
It was evidence of Israel’s invasion of Syrian territory – the temporary seizure, the report said, of a UN-controlled buffer zone established in a ceasefire agreement 50 years ago.
“Maybe they leave, maybe they stay, maybe they make the area safe and then leave,” said Riyad Zaidan, who lives in Hadar. “We want to hope, but we’ll have to wait and see.”
The village chief, Jawdat al-Tawil, pointed to the Golan Heights area that Israel occupied in 1967, clearly visible from the terraces of Hadar.
Many residents here have relatives who still live there.
Now they see Israeli troops routinely moving around their own village, parts of which extend into the demilitarized zone. On a slope above, Israeli bulldozers can be seen working on the hill.
A week after President Assad’s regime fell, the sense of freedom here is laced with fatalism.
Jawdat al-Tawil proudly told me how the village had defended itself against militias during the Syrian civil war, and showed me portraits of the dozens of men who had died.
“We will not allow anyone to trespass on our land,” he said. “[But] Israel is a state – we cannot oppose it. We used to stand up to individuals, but Israel is a superpower.”
The IDF has released images of troops operating in Syria [IDF]
Since the fall of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad earlier this month, Israel has also carried out hundreds of airstrikes on military targets across Syria.
And Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced new plans to double the population of Israeli settlements in the occupied Golan Heights, saying the move was necessary because of “the new front” that had opened in Syria.
Before that plan was unveiled, Syrian interim leader Ahmed al-Sharaa warned that Israel’s military maneuvers risked unwarranted escalation in the region and said his government did not want conflict with Israel.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry said its actions were necessary due to threats from jihadist groups operating along the ceasefire line with Syria, describing the military incursions there as “limited and temporary.”
The residents of Hadar mainly belong to the Druze community – a close-knit, introverted group that split from mainstream Shia Islam centuries ago.
When Israel occupied part of the Golan Heights in the 1967 war and later unilaterally annexed it, some Druze there chose to remain and take Israeli citizenship.
Al-Sharaa, the leader of the Syrian militia Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) that forced President Assad from power this month, has his family roots in the occupied Golan Heights.
Some here on the Syrian-controlled side fear that Israel’s plan is to seize more territory for itself.
Israel has been fighting the Iranian-backed militia there that supported Assad for years. This border area is a key arms supply route between Tehran and the proxy forces it holds, including the Lebanese militia Hezbollah.
The fall of Assad has made these groups – and Iran – weaker. But Israel has since stepped up its military campaign, taking advantage of the political vacuum to expand its reach.
It has also targeted military equipment left by Assad’s forces at bases across the country as it worries about who might use it in the future.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Sunday that the “imminent risks” to Israel remained and that recent developments in Syria had increased the threat, “despite the moderate appearance that the rebel leaders claim to present.”
Marginalized by the Assad regime, and targeted by infidels by Sunni jihadist groups like HTS, Syria’s Druze are more tolerant of Israel than many other communities here.
The Israeli-controlled area is visible from homes in Hadar [BBC]
The village used to fight the Iranian-backed groups that Israel sees as a threat here, but Jawdat al-Tawil told me that alliances in the area were shifting, and that he was now talking to these groups about reaching a deal .
Syria is not a place where people have relied on only one ally, or fought only one enemy.
“We just need peace,” resident Riyad Zaidan told me. “We’ve had enough war, enough blood, enough hard living – we have to stop.”
Religious minorities such as the Druze suffered under Assad. The new leaders of the HTS country have pledged tolerance and respect for Syria’s diverse ethnic and religious groups.
But eight years ago the group was still linked to global jihadist groups such as Al-Qaeda.
It was around the time HTS split from al-Qaeda in 2016 that Jawdat al-Tawil’s son Abdo was killed by their militiamen on the outskirts of Hadar while fighting for the Syrian army.
He showed me the path where 30-year-old Abdo died and I asked what he thought about HTS now taking control of Syria.
‘First it was gangs. Now they are rid of the tyrant [Assad]and came to power,” he said. “They are supposed to rule justly, provide security and guarantee people’s rights.”
“It is not yet clear whether they have changed,” he said. “I hope so.”
Additional reporting by Yousef Shomali, Charlotte Scarr and Mayar Mohanna
