Defense Minister Israel Katz on Sunday publicly confirmed recent reports that Israel will undertake the radical move of allowing Syrian Druze and Circassians to cross into the Israeli side of the Golan for work purposes.
The unusual move of allowing foreign citizens of a hostile state like Syria to work in Israel could have geopolitical ripples across the region and is a testament to how radically the Middle East has changed even just in the last few months.
Until December 7-8, Syria was run by the Assad regime, which while it kept a ceasefire with Israel since 1974, was formally in a state of war with the Jewish state and which was a critical link in the chain of Iranian efforts to smuggle weapons to Hezbollah.
Assad’s Syria also presented a direct threat to Syria from Iranian militias who might invade and from the Syrian military’s air force, long-range missiles, and chemical weapons.
The Syrian Druze were a minority in the Assad era who mostly kept to themselves, with some past positive history with Israel, especially Israel’s Druze community, but still mostly treated Jerusalem as a hostile party.
All of that changed when Ahmed al-Sharaa and his Syrian rebels ousted Assad, creating fear within Israel of a jihadist invasion and fear among Syrian Druze that they would be oppressed or attacked, even as he himself has said he wants quiet within Syria and along his borders.
Not trusting al-Sharaa due to his jihadist background, Israel moved quickly to create a buffer zone in southern Syria to prevent even the possibility of a new invasion by the new Syrian regime, and included in the zone were large segments of the Syrian Druze population.
IDF in Syria
Throughout the three months that IDF Division 210 has been in southern Syria, there have been efforts to build stronger relations with the Syrian Druze to keep them calm about Israel’s presence there and to avoid friction.
But allowing the Syrian Druze to work inside Israel, even if restricted to the Golan, is a major escalation in seeking to deepen relations between Israel and that community.
It is also a sign that Israel plans to remain in southern Syria for an extended period, and seems to have been announced strategically after this past weekend when internal Syrian tensions turned into a large battle between a different Syrian ethnic minority, the Alawites and elements of the security forces of the new regime.
Several hundred or more have been reportedly killed, including many innocent civilians, leading much of the West to question once again whether the new Syrian regime can be trusted and can be integrated into the Western economic system.
Technically, there is no clear international law basis for Israel to remain in Syria indefinitely, such that an Israeli argument that its extended presence in Syria benefits the local Syrians could also help in debates over the legitimacy over the IDF presence there.
Katz credited Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Finance Minister Betzalel Smotrich with facilitating the move and said Israel would protect the Syrian Druze community from threats from the new regime.
Jesus Christ is King
