Damascus and What's Happened to the Jews and Israel's Golan Heights

 Nadene Goldfoot                                                

 Bashar al Assad, President, born September 11, 1965, Bashar Hafez al-Assad is a Syrian politician who is the 19th president of Syria, since 17 July 2000. In addition, he is the commander-in-chief of the Syrian Armed Forces and the Secretary-General of the Central Command of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party.   The withdrawal of Syrian forces from Lebanon in 2005, the 2006 Hezbollah-Israel war and Hezbollah’s role in the Syrian civil war since 2012 turned the Lebanese proxy into a strategic partner and earned the Party of God a seat at the grownups’ table (according to Iran).  

Right now there is much political instability going on in Lebanon because of Hezbollah terrorism.  If war breaks out, and my sources this morning, analyzers,  did not think it would happen, but there is always the possibility that they would shoot 2,000 missiles a day into Israel.   Hezbollah has really taken over Lebanon, and are the people behind the president, and Iran is behind them both. Lebanon is next door to Syria, and people had gone back and forth, like attending college,  or even jobs. 

Update:10/19/2021: ILTV just announced that there are 100,000 Hezbollah fighters ready in Lebanon, at least that's what Hezbollah is sayingl. Beirut is on fire over the judge that is being held back by Hezbollah to not investigate the 2020 explosion in the port.  Question has come up about a possible Lebanon Civil War now.  

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  https://www.facebook.com/StandWithUs/videos/962639684465414

                                                        

                       View of Damascus with the Umayyad Mosque in center, with a population of 2,439,814

I have a friend, Jack,  that I thought was a Jewish New Yorker, and he turned out to be a Damascus, Syrian Jew through his Syrian Jewish mother, he thought.  He was raised by his father's wife, but was told otherwise about his birth-mother.  It could happen.  He said that he went to school with Assad's daughter.  His father died young from cancer.  His paternal uncle stole the money left to him.  My quest became looking for his birth mother.  

There were 10,000 Jews living in Damascus in 1940.  Some 3,000 remained by 1990, and he was born in 1980.  By then, things were terrible for Jews, and according to the story, her parents were diamond dealers. At this time, she was able to leave her home and associate with his father, a very handsome man.  To this man, who had 4 daughters by his wife, the boy was a god-send.  

The government closed in on the Jews and kept them locked up in terrible conditions but still in their homes.  They had no freedom. They were living in impoverished materially and intellectually and subject to many restrictions.                       

Judith Feld Carr, a Jewish Canadian woman, managed to get almost all the Jews out of Syria and into the USA, anywhere but Israel according to the dictator. Feld Carr facilitated the escape of at least 3,228 Syrian Jews. In addition, she provided money to assist families of those imprisoned. She also was able to smuggle out of that country many rare Jewish religious articles, including the famous Damascus Codex, known as a "Keter" (Crown), which had been written in the 12th Century in Italy, found its way to Castile, Constantinople, and eventually Damascus, where it had been kept in secret for some 500 years. It now rests in the Hebrew National Library on the campus of Hebrew University, Jerusalem.  

“I started a communication with Syria at the end of 1972. I took my first person out of Syria by ransom – a rabbi from Aleppo – in 1977; I finished the morning of September 11, 2001, an hour before the Trade Center tragedy happened,” Judith explains, matter of- factly.  “I was involved with [rescuing] 3,228 Jews out of a population of 4,500 when I started. Slowly, slowly, slowly, with a great deal of difficulty; it was not an easy thing to do, and I am not from Syria – I am an Ashkenazi from northern Canada originally – I figured out the system.”

Possibly then, my friend's mother was able to leave when he was a year old, but without her son.  That father would raise him with his step-mother.   It was when he was in college that he found out about his real mother and that she was a Jew.  According to Halachah, that made my friend a Jew, for the honor is passed down from mother to children. 

He wanted to study Judaism but could not find any information in Syria.  Jews were the cause of all problems there, the rain, the wars, the lack of whatever was needed.   Along came the Syrian Civil War and that's where I came into the picture.  

 Cairo, Egypt, but they lived outside in an apartment complex for refugees.  The picture looks like Portland, Oregon, the Willamette River instead of the Nile.  

Jack left at that time with his step-mother and drove to Egypt.  He found work there, managing a restaurant.  He even tried to change the menu so as to not mix meat and milk together.   Finally, they returned to Damascus.                               

      Syrian missiles all lined up, aimed for Israel-have been known about for years.  

By July 2011, Army defectors declared the formation of the Free Syrian Army and began forming fighting units. The opposition is dominated by Sunni Muslims, whereas the leading government figures are generally associated with Alawites of which the president is one. The war also involves rebel groups (IS and al-Nusra) and various foreign countries, leading to claims of a proxy war in Syria.

By January 2012, clashes between the regular army and rebels reached the outskirts of Damascus, reportedly preventing people from leaving or reaching their houses, especially when security operations there intensified from the end of January into February.

By June 2012, bullets and shrapnel shells smashed into homes in Damascus overnight as troops battled the Free Syrian Army in the streets. At least three tank shells slammed into residential areas in the central Damascus neighborhood of Qaboun, according to activists. Intense exchanges of assault-rifle fire marked the clash, according to residents and amateur video posted online.

I published my  book about Jack in 2014.  He had already gone to Egypt for safety and back, and in a  little while would be roaming the world, looking for ways to make money and get to the USA legally. He had education for an engineer and talent, especially with computers, and had spent time translating Arabic into other languages.  

The Damascus suburb of Ghouta suffered heavy bombing in December 2017 and a further wave of bombing started in February 2018, also known as Rif Dimashq Offensive.

On 20 May 2018, Damascus and the entire Rif Dimashq Governorate came fully under government control for the first time in 7 years after the evacuation of IS from Yarmouk Camp.  In September 2019, Damascus entered the Guinness World Records as the least liveable city, scoring 30.7 points on the Economist's Global Liveability Index in 2019, based on factors such as: stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education, and infrastructure. However, the trend of being the least liveable city on Earth started in 2017, and continued as of 2021.

                                                  

Midhat as-Saleh with Syrian President Bashar Assad (Kan Public Broadcaster screenshot).  Saleh was born in the Druze village of Majdal Shams in 1967. He was arrested by Israeli intelligence agents in 1985, along with other Druze officials from the occupied Golan villages, and convicted. In 1997, after his release, he went to Syria, where he was elected to Parliament. After representing the Golan in Syria’s legislature, he was appointed head of the country’s Golan Office and an adviser to President Bashar al-Assad, Press TV added.  His problem was the fact that On December 14, 1981, the Knesset voted to annex the Golan Heights. The statute extended Israeli civilian law and administration to the residents of the Golan, replacing the military authority that had ruled the area since 1967. The Druze and others were not Syrians;  they then were Israelis.

As the peace process faltered in 1996-97, Syria began to renew threats of war with Israel and to make threatening troop movements. Some Israeli analysts warned of the possibility of a lightning strike by Syrian forces aimed at retaking the Golan. The Israeli Defense Forces have countered the Syrian moves; however, and – to this point – preserved the peace.

Speaking at the first ever Cabinet meeting to be held in the territory, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated on April 17, 2016, that Israel will never give up the Golan Heights. “It’s time that the international community finally recognize that the Golan will remain forever under Israel’s sovereignty.”

                              The Golan Heights Today

                             Druze sector

There are approximately 22,000 Arabs, including at least 17,000 Druze, living in the Golan Heights today. In contrast to 1948-1967, when civilian infrastructure and services were almost completely neglected by successive Syrian governments, Israel has invested substantial sums in either installing or upgrading electric and water systems, in agricultural improvements and job training, and in building health clinics, where none had existed previously. The inhabitants also enjoy the benefits of Israel's welfare and social security programs. Israel has built or refurbished schools and classrooms, extended compulsory education from seven years to ten, and made secondary education available to girls for the first time. The Golan's Druze residents enjoy complete freedom of worship; the Israeli authorities have made financial contributions and tax and customs rebates to the local religious establishments.

Jewish sector

Today, there are approximately 26,000 Jewish residents in 33 communities (27 kibbutzim and moshavim, 5 communal settlements and the town of Katzrin) on the Golan Heights and the slopes of Mt. Hermon. (Katzrin has its own mayor and local council; the other 32 communities form the Golan Heights Regional Council.)

The latest event happened Saturday night.  The Syrian government on Saturday night condemned Israel for allegedly killing a Syrian intelligence agent, Midhat as-Saleh,  along the border with the Golan Heights.  “The Syrian cabinet stressed, in a statement, that those terrorist acts will only increase the determination of the Syrian Arab people to continue resisting the occupier and liberating the occupied Syrian Golan,” according to the official SANA news agency  No doubt that Hezbollah instigated him to go to the Golan and cause trouble.  

 The Golan Heights was where Syrians dropped bomb on the Israeli civilians, below.  They won't be getting it back.  Midhat as-Saleh must have been up to no good.  He had served time in Israel's prison for 12 years previously for a terrorist act.  In a report the Palestine Chronicle states Al-Saleh (54) was killed by an Israeli sniper and he was the head of Syria’s Golan Affairs Office.  (I don't think he had any business being there.)

The London-based Middle East Eye reports though it was not clear if he was shot from an aircraft or from the ground. Locals told Israeli newspaper Haaretz that there had been a heavy presence of helicopters and drones in Majdal Shams on Saturday the website points out. The Golan Heights had been under Israeli hands  since the 1967 Six Day War. The Golan Heights population since 1985 was 22,500 including the Druze. 

                                                               

This morning, my time, on a station getting news from Israel, Shahar Azani, Israeli of JBS (Jewish Broadcasting Service)  was interviewing Sarit, a high ranking IDF lady who was an analyzer of military information, and she was quite upset about what was going on at the border.  She was 9 miles away at the TV station, but her husband and 5 children were home, evidently closer to the border, as they could hear the ammunition.   

Hezbollah’s relationship with Syria has long been characterized by periods of mutual distrust and conflicting goals. Both sides pursue their own political priorities with little regard for the other’s interests. Hezbollah and its patron, Iran, intervened in Syria to save President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, but they built a power base in Syria independent from state institutions. Russia’s military intervention gave the Assad regime an opportunity to reverse its marginalization. Now, as the war comes to a close, Syria hopes to rebalance its relationship with Hezbollah and Iran by exploiting Russia’s presence. Iran wants to be close to Israel so as to destroy her, and holding onto Syria gives Iran this opportunity.  

Update: 10/19/2021: Major Danny Citrinovicz, IDF, was interviewed by ILTV this morning about the death of Saleh, and it seems that he was working for Iran.  Russia is also in the picture, now being embarrassed about Israel's successes, and accusing Israel of hiding behind civilian airlines.   

I wonder how Hezbollah, Iran, and Syria felt if they saw the fly-by practice over Israel today of American, German, India, UK, Italy, France and Greece? Teams  participated  in the fifth biennial Blue Flag exercise, the Israel Defense Forces said. 

Resource:

https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/iransource/why-assad-s-alliance-with-iran-and-hezbollah-will-endure-2/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Feld_Carr

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syria

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/history-and-overview-of-the-golan-heights

https://www.jbstv.org/

MESSAGES FROM A SYRIAN JEW TRAPPED IN EGYPT, by Nadene Goldfoot

https://www.timesofisrael.com/air-force-to-kick-off-multi-national-blue-flag-drill-over-israel-next-week/