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A leader of the Druze population of the Golan Heights disputed the assertion of a United Nations committee that accused Israel of imposing economic and social hardships on his community. Dulan abu-Saleh, the mayor of Majdal Shams, the largest Druze town in the Golan, told Makor Rishon that the U.N. Economic and Social Council’s recent statement on the area was “a total joke,” the daily reported Friday. Unlike other Druze populations in Israel serve in the Israel Defense Forces, the Golan’s Druze population of some 20,000 has been careful not to align itself publicly with the Jewish state, which annexed...

The United States does not consider the Golan Heights to be a part of Israel, State Department spokesperson John Kirby stressed on Monday, a day after Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu vowed the Golan Heights "will forever remain under Israeli sovereignty." "The U.S. position on the issue is unchanged," Kirby told reporters during a daily briefing at the State Department in Washington, according to Haaretz. "This position was maintained by both Democratic and Republican administrations. Those territories are not part of Israel and the status of those territories should be determined through negotiations. The current situation in Syria does not allow...

JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday his country will never withdraw from the Golan Heights and the strategic plateau bordering Syria will forever stay in Israeli hands. In a ceremonial Cabinet meeting in the Golan marking the one-year anniversary of his current government's formation, Netanyahu said he doubts Syria will ever return to what it was before the devastating civil war that has gripped it for more than five years. He said he would not oppose diplomatic efforts to stabilize Syria as long as they didn't come at the expense of Israel's security. Netanyahu added that, regardless,...

It didn't take Syria long to respond to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's Cabinet meeting on the Golan Heights Sunday, in which he declared Israel will never surrender the region that was liberated in the 1967 Six Day War. Shortly after the meeting on Sunday, Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Al-Mekdad told Lebanon's al-Mayadeen that his regime will "retake the Golan Heights by any means necessary, including using military force." "The Arab Syrian Golan is an occupied territory," claimed Al-Mekdad, referencing UN Security Council resolutions calling the area Syrian. According to the Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister, Netanyahu's Cabinet meeting was a...

In a first reaction to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's declaration that "Israel will never leave the Golan Heights," Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal al-Miqdad said Sunday that Syria is prepared to use every possible means to recapture the area, including military means. "The Syrian Golan is an occupied Arab land according to the UN Security Council's resolutions, and the presence of the United Nations Disengagement Observer Forces proves this," Miqad said in an interview with the Lebanon-based TV channel al-Mayadeen. "We have never renounced the resistance and we are ready to recapture the Golan in all possible ways, including military ways....

Israel’s Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon said on Tuesday that if he had to choose between the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) and Iran on the country’s borders, he would “choose ISIS” every time. In comments made at the Institute for National Security Studies’ (INSS) conference in Tel Aviv, Yaalon said that if the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad were to fall ...

Baku - APA. Russia could give asylum to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad if he has to leave his country, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in an interview published on January 12, according to RFE/RL. "It was surely more difficult to grant [U.S. national security contractor Edward] Snowden asylum in Russia than it would be in the case of Assad," Putin told the German tabloid Bild, referring to the American leaker of classified U.S. documents who was given asylum in Russia in 2013. Putin said it was too early to say whether Russia would have to give shelter to Assad as...

In a move dubbed "surreal" by a leading UN watchdog, and as a campaign of daily Palestinian terrorist attacks continues to target Israelis, the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday adopted six resolutions - all of which bar none condemned Israel. Not a single mention was made of the Palestinian attacks, which have left 22 Israelis dead and hundreds wounded, nor did any other countries - even serial human rights violators such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, Russia and others - receive any of the General Assembly's attention. More disturbingly still, five of the the UNGA resolutions were sponsored by the...

'Severe blow': Al Qaeda suicide bomber takes out leadership of key ISIS brigadeHAIFA, Israel – A recent suicide bombing in southern Syria shows the rivalry between Al Qaeda and ISIS is more than just a contest to see who can kill the most infidels -- the groups are using classic terror techniques on each other. The Nov. 15 bombing came at a top-level meeting of the Yarmouk Martyrs Brigade, a key ISIS militia known for its bloody and vicious hold over parts of the Golan Heights. Six of the group’s top men were killed, including Muhammad "Abu Ali" al-Baridi,...

The Yarmouk Martyrs Brigade, which operates near the border, praises Israel’s medical assistance for refugees, fighters A Syrian rebel group operating along the Israeli border in the Golan Heights said it has no quarrel with Israel, and that its fight is with President Bashar Assad, not the Jewish state — and it will remain that way. Speaking with The Times of Israel by telephone in Arabic, a spokesperson for the Yarmouk Martyrs Brigade — the militia that kidnapped UN peacekeepers in March and May — said, “We are only here to fight Assad; we want nothing from Israel and we...

In defiance of European Union guidelines, Hungary will not label products from Judea, Samaria and the Golan Heights. Indeed, its foreign minister urges greater cooperation with Israel in fighting global terrorism. Speaking at a breakfast meeting of the Israel Council on Foreign Relations on Monday, Hungarian Foreign Minister and Trade Minister Peter Szijjarto, who was on a 24-hour visit to Israel, said that his country will not label products from Judea, Samaria and the Golan Heights, calling the EU’s decision to do so “irrational.” “We do not support that decision. It is an inefficient instrument. It is irrational and does...

US President Barack Obama's administration on Thursday voiced its approval of the discriminatory EU decision the day before to label Jewish goods from Judea, Samaria, eastern Jerusalem and the Golan Heights. The administration said the move is only a "technical guideline," and is not a boycott, reports Associated Press - despite the obvious assumption that consumers would follow the labeling when choosing what products to buy. US State Department spokesperson Mark Toner said, "we do not believe that labeling the origin of products is equivalent to a boycott. And as you know, we do not consider settlements to be part...

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on Wednesday likened the European Union's decision to label Jewish goods from Judea, Samaria, eastern Jerusalem and the Golan Heights to the Nazi boycott of Jewish businesses. Israel in retaliation also called off a number of scheduled EU meetings. "The labeling of products of the Jewish state by the European Union brings back dark memories, Europe should be ashamed of itself," Netanyahu said as he wrapped up a visit to Washington. "It took an immoral decision...this will not advance peace, it will certainly not advance truth and justice. It's wrong," he said in an English-language video...

The megalithic complex of Rogem Hiri (Rujm al-Hiri in Arabic, meaning stone heap of the wild cat) is located in the central Golan, some 16 km. east of the Sea of Galilee, on a desolate plateau of basalt boulders. Since its discovery in a survey of the Golan in the late 1960s, this mysterious site has aroused the curiosity of archeologists. Between 1988 and 1991, archeological excavations and research were conducted in order to establish facts and determine the time of its construction and its function. Rogem Hiri is a monumental construction of local basalt fieldstones of various sizes. It...

Discovery of oil in ISRAEL means the Jewish state could soon produce ‘significant quantities’ of ‘black gold’… and potentially change the face of the Middle East Vast oil reserves have been discovered in Israel that could transform the country into world energy power and change the face of the Middle East for years to come. Afek Oil and Gas, an Israeli subsidiary of the U.S. company Genie Energy, said the breakthrough came in the Golan Heights, near the border with Syria. Yuval Bartov, the firm’s chief geologist, said there was ‘enormous excitement’ about the immense wealth it could bring to...

Over four decades after the 1973 war that saw Egyptian forces seize of the Sinai Peninsula from occupying Israeli forces in a shock offensive, the legacy of the brief conflict lives on. One of the tales of the war known by some Egyptians is the existence of a “secret code” used by the Egyptian army that Israeli intelligence was unable to crack. The cypher was simple yet unorthodox: using an unwritten language from one of Egypt’s ethnic minorities, the Nubians. With the system, words and commands that would have been undecipherable to even a veteran Israeli intelligence officer could be...

The project involves three years of exploration for conventional oil, north of Nahal El Al near Moshav Natur, a former kibbutz on the southern Golan Heights. Drilling was set to begin at a Golan Heights oil exploration site in the late night hours of Monday, the company announced that evening. The project, which is being implemented by Afek Oil and Gas, involves three years of exploration for conventional oil using up to 10 wells. The company chose site No. 5 out of 10 to start with, located north of Nahal El Al near Moshav Natur, a former kibbutz on the...

The Israeli military said Sunday it struck two Syrian army posts with artillery fire after rockets from the war-torn country landed in Israeli-controlled territory. The military said the two rockets, which landed over the last two days, were errant fire from the Syrian conflict. They caused no damage or injuries. Lt. Col. Peter Lerner, an Israeli military spokesman, said in a statement that Israel holds the Syrian military "responsible and accountable for any aggression emanating from Syria." Rami Abdurrahman, the head of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said a Syrian army position in the Quneitra region of the...

Photo Islamic State-linked militants struck Egyptian army outposts in the Sinai Peninsula on Wednesday in a coordinated wave of suicide bombings and battles that underlined the government's failure to stem an insurgency despite a two-year crackdown. Security officials said dozens of troops were killed, along with nearly 100 attackers. After the attack, which took place just across the border from Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, "We send our condolences to the government and people of Egypt, and to the families of the Egyptians that were slain by this vicious terrorism." Later on Wednesday, Netanyahu said, "We see ISIS [Islamic...

President Richard Nixon was drunk during the height of the 1973 Yom Kippur War, according to veteran journalist Tim Weiner writing for Politico magazine. Weiner’s book, One Man Against the World: The Tragedy of Richard Nixon, makes the charge. The former New York Times reporter claims that a call recorded by Henry Kissinger proves Nixon was drunk on the fifth day of the crisis after Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on Israel which caught their Intelligence agency by surprise. It became clear in the hours after the 1973 Yom Kippur attack that the Arabs had surprised Israeli forces...