Syrian al-Qaeda faction Jabhat al-Nusra continues to make deep inroads in capturing territory south of Damascus, and its troops now control much of the foothills of the Golan Heights.
Nusra fighters seized a hilltop position within view of Israel’s border forces, and rose the flag of al-Qaeda over the area. The civil war has finally put al-Qaeda forces directly on Israel’s frontier.
Though Syrian government forces have chased the Islamist faction out of most of metro Damascus and even the area up to the Lebanon border, they have largely left the Syrian-held portion of Golan lightly defended.
This has been the case for more than a year now, since Israel began talking up the idea of invading Golan themselves to establish a new “buffer zone” from the civil war on their border. Syria’s military likely feels it isn’t worth fighting over land that Israel is liable to take anyhow.
The region along the Israeli and Jordanian borders amounts to most of Jabhat al-Nusra’s real territorial possession these days, as they have lost most of their significant northern strongholds to rival al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) in bloody battles. AQI is mostly unseen on the southern front, where Nusra is fighting alongside US-armed rebels infiltrating from Jordan.
The Golan is NOT Israeli territory. It is Israeli occupied territory and the entire world does not recognize their illegal anexsation of the Syrian heights.
The demarcation line between the occupation forces and Syria is NOT the Israeli border Mr. Ditz. Please stop reinforcing this notion that the land is Israeli land. It is not!
In typical fashion, your headline is equally misleading, giving the impression that Al quaida forces have crossed the Golan demarcation line and are now "deep inside the Golan" Israeli occupied territory. On their side of the demarcation line, the terrorist forces are NOT even in the Golan.
…and If "al-qaeda" are in any part of the Israeli-occupied Golan, then they are there with the full cooperation of the IDF…not to mention any part of Syrian territory…
Israel's border forces??? First of all Israel does not acknowledge where it's borders are-having not finished stealing other people's land. Second, the Golan is emphatically not Israeli Territory not one country in the world recognises Israel's illegal occupation and annexation of the territory, not one,none.