As Syrian Druze plight deepens, Israel’s regional strategy emerges

As Syrian Druze plight deepens, Israel’s regional strategy emerges

Published 24 June 2015

 

On Tuesday morning, Druze on the Golan Heights attacked an Israeli military ambulance carrying two wounded Syrian rebels to a hospital in Israel, killing one of the wounded rebels. Israeli Druze – and the Druze on the Golan Heights – want Israel to help their fellow Druze in Syria, who until recently had been loyal to President Bashar al-Assad, but Israel’s tacit understanding with the Sunni rebels, including the Islamist Nusra Front, indicates that Israel supports those groups in Syria which are supported by the major Sunni states in the region. There used to be a time when Israel allied itself with countries and groups on the geographic, ethnic, and religious periphery of the Middle East – what David Ben Gurion called the Periphery Alliance – but times have changed, and Israel now is seeking a modus vivendi with the region’s Sunni powers. The Druze may be paying the price of this change in Israel’s strategy.

Tensions between Druze residents of the Golan Heights and the Israeli military flared up Tuesday when about 150 Druze stopped a military ambulance carrying two wounded members of an anti-Assad rebel group. The ambulance was carrying the wounded rebels from the border area to a hospital in Israel for treatment, but the Druze forced the ambulance’s doors open, chased away the two Israeli military medics, then pulled the two wounded Syrians and, according to eye witnesses, “lynched” one of them and seriously wounded the other.
Israeli military units dispersed the crowd and saved the second Syrian.
The medics were slightly wounded from rocks thrown at them by the Druze crowd.
The Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, called the incident “very serious” and said those behind the attack would be held to account.
“We will not let anyone take the law into their hands and prevent the army from carrying out its mission,” he said in a statement, appealing for leaders in the Druze community to maintain calm.
Israeli defense minister Moshe Yaalon pledged to track down the rioters. “We won’t be able to ignore it, and law enforcement authorities will deal with it heavy-handedly,” he said in a statement.