The Middle East is once again at a breaking point. In late 2024, Syria’s long-time ruler, Bashar al-Assad, was overthrown in a sudden rebel offensive. As chaos unfolded, Israel launched a large-scale airstrike campaign in Syria, destroying over 80% of the former government's military assets. But that was just the beginning.
Israel also moved into strategic areas of Southern Syria, capturing land along the Yarmouk River and Mount Hermon - placing its forces just 20 km from Damascus. Meanwhile, tensions escalated as Israel demanded a demilitarized buffer zone across Syria’s southern provinces, aiming to counter the rise of islamist militias and to protect the local Druze community.
After incidents were reported in the Druze neighbourhood of Damascus, Israel's defence ministry said that the Israeli military had been instructed to prepare for an operation - all the while a new Druze military faction, the “Suweyda Military Council" formed.
Could this spark a new Israel-Syria war over the Golan Heights? Will Israel invade and attempt to create a Druze buffer state? In this video, we break down the history of the Golan Heights dispute, from the Six-Day War to the Yom Kippur War, and explore what might happen next in this high-stakes geopolitical struggle.
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Music:
Before Dawn by Audionautix (YouTube Audio-library)
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Artist: http://audionautix.com/
Desert Caravan by Aaron Kenny (YouTube Audio-library)
A Baroque Letter by Aaron Kenny (YouTube Audio-library)
Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 by Liszt (YouTube Audio-library)
Russian Dance by Joey Pecoraro (YouTube Audio-library)
Shadoma by The Mini Vandals (YouTube Audio-library)
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Sources (That are not featured directly in the video):
Yigal Kipnis (2013) The Golan Heights: Political history, settlement and geography since 1949
Aryeh Shalev (1994) Israel and Syria: Peace and Security on the Golan
Anthony H. Cordesman (2008) Israel and Syria: The Military Balance and Prospects of War
For more information about other sources I used, feel free to email me.
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#israel #syria #druze