Israel on Alert as Syrians Fight at Border

European Pressphoto Agency
Smoke caused by shelling rose on the Syrian side of the border on Thursday near the Israeli-Syrian border crossing of Quneitra, in the Golan Heights.

By ISABEL KERSHNER
Published: June 6, 2013

JERUSALEM — Rebels fighting the Syrian government seized the only border crossing along the Israeli-Syrian cease-fire line in the Golan Heights on Thursday, according to the Israeli military and rebel groups, forcing the United Nations peacekeeping soldiers who patrol the crossing to vacate it and bringing the Syrian conflict ever closer to Israeli-held territory.

Israeli forces were placed on alert along the frontier as the violence of the Syrian civil war threatened to spill over.
The rebel takeover of the border crossing, Quneitra, lasted for several hours. Later in the day Syrian state news media reported government forces had routed the insurgents and established control. Clashes in the area raged through much of the day.
The mayhem was enough to threaten the continuation of the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force, the longtime peacekeeping mission in the sensitive and disputed area.
The Quneitra crossing is patrolled by Austrian United Nations peacekeepers, who were ordered to pull back for their own safety.
Later in Vienna the Austrian government said it was withdrawing its contingent from the force. Austria’s chancellor, Werner Faymann, was quoted by APA, the Austrian press agency, as saying he had spoken with Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations secretary general, and “personally informed him about the decision.”
Josephine Guerrero, a spokeswoman for the United Nations peacekeeping forces, confirmed in an e-mail message that Austria had informed the United Nations of its intended withdrawal.
“Austria has been a backbone of the mission and their withdrawal will impact the mission’s operational capacity,” Ms. Guerrero said. “We are in discussions with them about timing, and with other troop-contributing countries to provide replacement troops.”
She also said two personnel from the peacekeeping force were injured by mortar rounds fired in the area but did not further identify them.
Austrians account for about 380 of the 1,000-strong United Nations force that has monitored the disengagement zone between Israeli and Syrian forces on the Golan Heights since 1974. The Philippines provides about 300 and India provides the rest. A fourth country, Croatia, withdrew its contingent earlier this year.
Twice in recent months a rebel group has taken groups of the Filipino peacekeepers captive, releasing them unharmed after several days. The Philippine government has been considering pulling its peacekeepers out of the area.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement expressing regret over Austria’s decision and said it hoped the Austrian withdrawal would “not be conducive to further escalation in the area.” The statement also said Israel expected the United Nations to maintain the peacekeeping force under the Security Council resolution that created it four decades ago.
But one senior Israeli government official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, downplayed the importance of international peacekeepers and said that in general there was “skepticism among the senior Israeli leadership as to the utility of international forces or monitors when things get tough.”
The official emphasized that he was not referring specifically to the Austrian decision or criticizing it, but that he was talking about “the larger picture.”
The Israeli government has long insisted on a doctrine of self-reliance regarding its security.
But analysts said that a disintegration of the United Nations peacekeeping force could certainly complicate the situation along the Israeli-Syrian frontier.
Amnon Sofrin, a retired Israeli brigadier-general who now lectures at Israel’s National Defense College, told reporters in a telephone briefing that the rebels were sending a message to President Bashar al-Assad of Syria that they were prepared to attack the government’s symbols after Syrian government forces and their Hezbollah allies from Lebanon pushed the rebels out of their symbolic stronghold of Qusayr this week.
Mr. Sofrin said that if the United Nations peacekeeping force withdrew, the buffer zone on the Golan Heights would become “a no-man’s land” where Israel might have to face the rebels more directly.
As the fighting raged around Quneitra, the Israeli military declared the Israeli side of the crossing a closed military zone and ordered farmers to stay out of fields near the cease-fire line.
An Israeli military official said that two mortar shells had landed in open areas on the Israeli side of the frontier in the course of the fighting.
The Israeli military also confirmed that two injured Syrians had reached Israeli forces at the frontier and had been taken for treatment at a hospital in northern Israel. Israel Radio reported that the trauma unit at the hospital in Safed had to be temporarily evacuated after staff found a live fragmentation grenade in the pocket of one of the Syrians. A bomb disposal unit disarmed the grenade and afterward the staff continued to treat the fighter, the radio said.
SANA, Syria’s official news agency, said that Israeli ambulances had transported some injured rebels, whom it called terrorists, into the Israeli-occupied territories, which it said constituted “new proof of the close link between these terrorist groups and the Israeli occupation.”
Israel has repeatedly declared that it has no intention of getting involved in the Syrian civil war but that it will act to protect its own interests. Israel’s minister of defense, Moshe Yaalon, said this week that Israel would not tolerate the transfer of advanced weapons from the Syrian government to Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia; a loss of Syrian government control over chemical weapons; or a heating up of the Golan frontier and a spillover of fire into Israeli-held territory.
Tensions have risen between Israel and Syria after three airstrikes on Syrian soil this year that targeted advanced weapons and were attributed to Israel.
There have been numerous instances of fire spilling over into the Israeli-held Golan Heights. The Israeli military said that much of it was assumed to be stray fire. But last month, Syria acknowledged it had intentionally attacked an Israeli target, a military vehicle that was shot at as it patrolled the cease-fire line. Syria said the jeep had crossed into its territory on the Golan Heights, which Israel denied.
In that instance and others, Israeli tanks have fired back several times at Syrian positions.
Mr. Assad of Syria warned recently that the government would retaliate against Israel for any further airstrikes and said that he was under popular pressure to open a new front against Israel in the Golan Heights.
Israel has beefed up its forces there in recent months and has been constructing a sturdy fence along the frontier.
The United Nations Disengagement Observer Force was set up to monitor the cease-fire line and buffer zone established between Israel and Syria after the 1973 war.
As well as United Nations personnel, the Quneitra crossing is used by members of the 20,000-strong Druse community of the Israeli-held Golan Heights who are Syrian citizens and travel to Syria to study or marry. Druse apple farmers also ship their crops to Syria via the crossing.
Israel seized a portion of the Golan Heights from Syria in the 1967 war and later effectively annexed the strategic plateau, which commands northern Israel and its main water sources.
Israel and Syria are still technically at war but the quiet that has prevailed for decades along the frontier has allowed Israel to develop the area as a military arena and a tourist destination. The wild and rocky terrain is also home to up to 20,000 Israeli Jews in more than 30 settlements although Israel’s annexation of the area has not been internationally recognized.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/07/world/middleeast/syrian-rebels-golan-heights.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0