The Golan Heights

Yigal Kipnis

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781136740992
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Middle Eastern History
• Index: History

Presenting the settlement landscape of the Golan before and after June 1967, The Golan Heights deals with the issue of the border between Israel and Syria, and with the Israeli settlement process in the area following the Six Day War.

The story of the Golan Heights and its position between Syria and Israel does not belong only to the past; it is still interwoven in the political present of the two countries. Public discourse in Israel on the political future of the Golan, and the direct and indirect political discussions between Israel and Syria, rest to a great extent on personal and collective memories, and these, by nature, are based on the past. The perceptions of the Israeli public were constructed upon the image of a mountain that became a monster. This image reached its peak on the eve of the Six Day War in June 1967, but continued to be consolidated and preserved in the Israeli collective memory, and so it has remained until the present.

Addressing the question of the political future of the Golan, a central issue for both Israel and the wider Middle East, this book will be an invaluable resource for students and scholars of Political History, Settlement Geography and Geopolitics.

Dr. Yigal Kipnis teaches International Relations at Haifa University. He received a BS in Civil Engineering from the Technion in Haifa and an MA and PhD in Land of Israel Studies from Haifa University. His first book, The Mountain That Was as a Monster: The Golan Between Syria and Israel, was published in 2009. His second book, 1973: The Way to War, published in 2012, immediately became a bestseller. It reveals the continuing political process which led to the Middle East war of October 1973.

1 The borders between Israel and Syria

One international border, multiple lines

The armistice lines between Israel and Syria are “not to be interpreted as having any relation whatsoever to ultimate territorial arrangements.”

(Article V of the 1949 Armistice Agreements)

In March 2000 US President Bill Clinton met with the President of Syria, Hafez al-Assad, in Geneva. The Syrian president had arrived at the meeting accompanied by a large Syrian delegation, knowing in advance that the American President would inform him that his demands regarding the borderline between Syria and Israel had been accepted by Israel. In Israel, Prime Minister Ehud Barak was awaiting the results of the meeting and the call to join the two presidents for a tripartite meeting during which the long political negotiations between the two countries would culminate in a peace treaty. In Geneva, Clinton presented Assad with a border drafted by Barak which was based on the retreat of the waterline of Lake Kinneret and which had been drawn about 500 meters east of its coastline. In terms of the Syrian presence in the area on the eve of the Six Day War, the line included territory which had not been under Syrian control in 1967. However, in one small area, the border passed 50 meters east of the pre-1967 Syrian line. Assad refused to accept this proposal and thus ended a political process of more than eight years of negotiations without a peace treaty.

In the political discussions between Syria and Israel from 1991 to 2000, the determination of the permanent border had been in dispute, but the disagreement had been reduced to a matter of minor adjustments to the international border. Syria demanded that the permanent border be based on the line which had existed on the eve of the Israeli capture of the Golan, termed the “fourth of June line.” In contrast to the international border, this line was not agreed upon nor was it marked, and thus, its determination would have involved prior agreement about the principles on which it had been based. As opposed to what is generally thought, in the strip of land which was the focus of disagreement between the two countries – northeast of Lake Kinneret and the Jordan highlands – the fourth of June line is not located west of the international border. The drop in the level of the lake by a few meters had meant that the Syrian line on the eve of the Six Day War in the northeast of the lake was, in 2000, located a few hundred meters east of the coast as it had existed. As a result, agreeing to the Syrian demand to receive the entire area it had held on 4 June 1967 would have distanced it from the lake waterline.

Before discussion of the Golan Heights, or consideration of the border relations between Syria and Israel and the political negotiations which they have conducted, it is important to become acquainted with the terms “the international border of 1923” and the “armistice line of 1949,” in addition to the “fourth of June line,” and to understand how they were designed.

The international border of 1923

The international border of 1923 was the first and only permanent political border established between Syria and Palestine, and between Lebanon and Palestine. The governments of Great Britain and France reached agreement, setting the border from the Mediterranean coast to El-Hama, approved in March 1923 by both governments and implemented in 1924.¹ Recognition by the international community completed the delineation of the political borders of Palestine after the southern international border with Egypt had been approved in 1921, and the border with Transjordan had been determined in 1922.

The process of determining the international border lasted seven years (1916–1923). It had begun at the height of the war and consisted of five stages: October 1916 – The Sykes–Picot Agreement; October 1918 – Establishment of Occupied Enemy Territory (OET) South, North and East; September 1919 – The Deauville Agreement; 23 October 1920 – The Paris Agreement; 7 March 1923 – The Newcombe-Paulet Agreement. The formation of the international border is described in Appendix A.

Determination of the border expressed the international balance of power after World War I, with Great Britain as the strongest power and the only one which maintained a significant military presence in the area. Thus, Britain succeeded in changing the Sykes–Picot Agreement to its own advantage, and to the detriment of the French Mandate in Syria and Lebanon. Zionist historiography has dealt with the question of the relative impact of the Zionist Movement and Jewish settlement in the Galilee on the determination of the border. Zionist political activity was based on the personal relationships of representatives of the Zionist viewpoint, and especially Chaim Weizmann, with the British and with figures in the international political system. But it appears that Britain, in its desire to expand the area of Palestine and to retain control of most of the water sources, was acting in its own political interests. The contribution of the Zionist Movement in this respect was that its demand to include the Litani River, Mount Hermon and the Golan Heights up to the Hijazi Railroad within the territory of Palestine aided Britain in its negotiations with France. However, it appears that neither the four Jewish settlements in the Upper Galilee (Metulla, Kfar Giladi, Tel Hai and Hamra), all of which had been abandoned during the period of negotiations, nor the events which had agitated the Jewish population in Palestine at the time, had any impact on British positions.

The determination of political borders in a rural living space which had not been subject to political limitations created practical problems in daily life. A committee established to discuss these problems formulated a “good neighbor” agreement, and this enabled free passage for the residents of the border area to operate means of production which were located in another country, reaffirmed the rights of Syrian residents to fish in Lake Hula, the Jordan River and Lake Kinneret, and determined work procedures to deal with possible future problems.

Until the Arab Revolt broke out in the British Mandate in April 1936, border supervision was extremely lax. In practice, there was free passage of people and products. This was especially striking during the 1930s; there were more employment opportunities in Palestine and many Syrian citizens crossed the border seeking work during a serious drought in southern Syria. After the Peel Commission had published its findings in July 1937, proposing to divide the territory of Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab state, the Arab Revolt resumed. This led the British government to act to close off the northern border in order to prevent the supply of aid to the rebel groups. World War II and the fall of France to Germany strengthened the political status of the border and, for about a year, from the end of 1940 to 1941, the tension between the two hostile states was high.

The border between Syria and Palestine began to develop an ethnic character with the establishment of Jewish settlements in the area. On the eve of the United Nations decision of 29 November 1947 to partition Palestine, there were 14 Jewish settlements along the border.

In 1946, the French Mandate had ended in Syria which had then become independent. Syria rejected the border agreement between France and Britain and demanded that the border pass through the more water abundant areas – the Hula Lake, the Jordan River and Lake Kinneret. In November 1946, it served Britain with a demand to readjust the border, which Britain refused. Syria’s demand was also expressed in military steps. In two cases, on 20 October 1947 and on 9 January 1948, Syrian forces crossed into Tel Dan, one of the water sources in the area, and in response, the British activated the Trans-Jordanian Frontier Force and the armored corps of the airborne division to eject them. However, towards the end of the British Mandate in Palestine in 1948, control of the border deteriorated and it was ultimately almost totally unsupervised.

The international borders of Palestine have withstood the test of military conflicts and political events between Israel and its neighbors. The permanent border between Israel and Egypt was set (1979) precisely according to its original determination, as was the border between Israel and Jordan (1994). Moreover, the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon (May 2000) correlated with the border set by United Nations experts (a border which reflected troop deployment in 1978), and in principle corresponded to the international border.

Syria and Israeli remain in disagreement about the permanent border dividing them, but despite changes in government on both sides of the border in addition to the three wars between the countries, the international border has not lost its validity. It was and continues to be a basic concept in the political process toward a peace agreement between the two states. In 1946, with the establishment of an independent Syria, it remained the border between Syria and Mandatory Palestine. In the United Nations Resolution of 29 November 1947, this line was adopted as the border between Syria and the State of Israel. On 20 July 1949, an armistice agreement was signed according to which Syria withdrew its forces to its side of this border after having occupied territories west of it, and the line was termed “the international boundary between Syria and Palestine” in the articles of the agreement. Through the years of conflict between Syria and Israel (1948–1967), Israel continued to seek recognition of the international boundary as its permanent border with Syria.

With the conquest of the Golan Heights by Israel on 10 June 1967, a ceasefire line was determined on the Golan. After expansion of this occupation in October 1973, on 31 May 1974, a disengagement line was established leaving most of the Golan in Israeli hands. However, on 19 June 1967, the national unity government in Israel had adopted a decision expressing its willingness to reach a peace agreement with Syria on the basis of the international border, with assurances of rights to the water sources in Israel. As no political negotiations were forthcoming, the Israeli government determined a more general policy regarding the peace border, based on United Nations Resolution 242 (and later, Resolution 338) regarding the evacuation from land which had been occupied by Israel and the negation of acquisition of land by war. In 1981, the government of Israel applied Israeli law on the Golan Heights, but nevertheless, did not invalidate its obligation to uphold Security Council resolutions and continued to see its cancellation of the military government in the Golan as a temporary arrangement until a peace treaty could be adopted. In 1991, the Madrid Conference was convened, based on the fact that Syria had also accepted Resolutions 242 and 338 as a basis for peace negotiations. In the political process which ensued between Israel and Syria, with the mediation of the United States between 1992 and 2000, all of the prime ministers of Israel agreed to the demand of Syrian President Assad that the international peace border would not be the international border, but would be based on the situation which existed in the area on 4 June 1967, before Israel had conquered the Golan.

The armistice agreement, 1949

On 15 May 1948, Syrian armed forces invaded the State of Israel along the southern sector of border – from south of Lake Kinneret. They captured Tzemach, Masada and Sha’ar Hagolan and were halted at the gates of Kibbutz Degania A and Degania B. They were then pushed eastward. Even though they failed to capture Ein Gev, from 21 May they occupied the southeastern Kinneret region from Tzemach eastward. Three weeks later, on 6 June, the Syrian army attacked in the central sector, captured Mishmar Hayarden and continued on to Hirbet Yarda (between Ayelet Hashachar and Mahanaim, about two kilometers to the east). According to the ceasefire lines, which defined the situation at the end of the fighting, the Syrians held land west of the international border in three sectors: in the north, Ramat Habanias (the area between the Banias and the Dan rivers, and west of Tel Azzaziat); in the center, from the environs of Dardara, south of the Hula Lake, a wedge in the area of the Jordan River and the peak of Hirbet Yarda, as well as the west of the Jordan estuary into Lake Kinneret, to Tel Motilla (today Almagor); in the south, that is, in the southeast of Lake Kinneret, from the coastal point located about two kilometers north of the present site of Kibbutz Ha’on up to a point which was later the site of Kibbutz Maagan.

On 20 June 1949 a armistice agreement was signed between Syria and Israel. For the developments which led to this agreement, see Appendix A.

The armistice demarcation line – where is the Green Line between Israel and Syria?

The armistice agreement defined the armistice line, determined by the line including territory which Syria had captured in the war. The area west of this line was the sovereign territory of Israel. The areas located between the armistice line and the international border were defined as demilitarized zones (DMZ) whose fate would be determined in peace negotiations which would take place between the two countries in the future.

The armistice line delimited the three demilitarized areas to the west. In these areas, which measured a total of 65 square kilometers, there were seven Arab villages with a population of about 2,500 inhabitants² and the only Jewish settlement among them – the village of Mishmar Hayarden – had been destroyed during the war and was abandoned.

According to the agreement, areas determined as belonging to the State of Israel according to the UN decision of November 1947 had remained on the far side (to the east) of the “Green Line.” These areas were: the southeast of Lake Kinneret from the waterline at a point between Kibbutz Ein Gev and Kibbutz Ha’on up to Kibbutz Ma’agan; an area in the northern Kinneret – a triangle from west of the Jordan whose vertex was at Tel Motilla (Almagor); the area around the B’not Ya’akov Bridge – a triangle west of the Jordan whose vertex was at Khirbet Yarda, and the area of the present-day Kibbutz Gadot and the present Moshav Mishmar Hayarden, as well as a strip about 100 meters wide, west of the Jordan, in the area of the Jordan River highlands to the Hula; in the northern sector – the Banias Heights. Kibbutz Ein Gev and its environs as well as Dardara, east of Lake Hula, remained to the west of the armistice lines according to the agreement, but Israel was forbidden to bring troops or auxiliary military personnel into the area. A strip of ten meters east of the Kinneret shoreline, northeast of the lake, which would later become a bone of contention and a cause of military conflicts, was not included in the demilitarized zone, and according to the armistice agreement, was under Israeli sovereignty.

The Green Line was the armistice line determined in the agreements between Israel and Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria. However, a look at Israeli maps issued before 1967 reveals that, in the sector of the border between Israel and Syria, the marking designated as the Green Line is located on the international border and not on the armistice line. This left the mistaken impression that the demilitarized areas were located within the Green Line, and this impression affected the attitude of the Israeli public about the conflict which was conducted over control of these areas.

The Sheba’a Farms – seasonal settlements built by Lebanese inhabitants in Syrian territory

The northern border of the Golan – the political border between Syria and Lebanon – was delineated after World War I. In contrast to other borders, it was not determined as a political border between different mandates, but rather, as an administrative dividing line within the French Mandate area between Syria and Lebanon. The government of France determined the line in 1920–1921, when they decided to separate Lebanon from Syria. The geopolitical reality of a non-binding administrative border continued to exist after Lebanon and Syria became independent states, due to Syrian involvement in Lebanese affairs, to terrain conditions, and to the area inhabitants’ way of life. The border ranged from the meeting point of the borders of Lebanon–Israel–Syria, south of the Ghajar Bridge, northwards from the west bank of the Hatzbani River to opposite the village of Ghajar. At this point, there is conflicting evidence regarding the border. Both French and Israeli maps which were published until 1967 mark the border south of the village, so that the entire village is in Lebanese territory. On other maps, both French maps after 1945, B...