Skip to main content

← The Neighbors

Syria: Mount Hermon, the Buffer Zone, and "Until Damascus"

Syria sits northeast of Israel. Between them is the Golan Heights, a high plateau Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 war and annexed in 1981. Only one country in the world recognizes that annexation: the United States, since March 2019. East of the Golan, a strip of land patrolled by UN peacekeepers kept the two armies apart under a 1974 agreement. Above it all stands Mount Hermon, the highest point in the region, from which, as one writer put it, "Damascus can be seen just 40 miles away" (Kit Klarenberg, MintPress News).

For most of the last fifty years Syria was ruled by the Assad family and allied with Iran. Iran moved weapons through Syria to Hezbollah in Lebanon. That made Syria the bridge in what Israeli leaders called Iran's "axis." When the Assad government collapsed on 8 December 2024, the bridge fell, and Israel moved the same day. This page shows what Israeli leaders have said about Syrian land, what the army has taken since, and how Syria and its neighbors have reacted.

What Israeli officials have said​

"Until Damascus." In an October 2024 documentary by the French-German channel Arte, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said: "I want a Jewish state. Bit by bit. It is written that the future of Jerusalem is to expand to Damascus. Until Damascus." Asked whether Israel's borders should extend beyond the Jordan River, he answered: "Absolutely, but slowly" (Critical Perspectives on X, 10 October 2024, video; Kevork Almassian on X, 10 October 2024). Full account on Smotrich: "Until Damascus".

"We will continue to hold onto it, develop it, and settle it." On 15 December 2024, a week after Assad fell, Netanyahu's office announced that the government "unanimously approved Netanyahu's plan to encourage settlement" on the Golan. Netanyahu: "Strengthening the Golan means strengthening Israel, & this is crucial during this period. We will continue to hold onto it, develop it, & settle it" (Ramy Abdu on X, 15 December 2024; BBC: "Israel plans to expand Golan settlements after fall of Assad," shared on X).

"An earthquake." Testifying at his corruption trial on 10 December 2024, Netanyahu said: "Something tectonic has happened here, an earthquake that hasn't happened in the 100 years since the Sykes-Picot Agreement" (as quoted by Kit Klarenberg). Sykes-Picot is the 1916 British-French deal that drew the modern borders of Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq. Netanyahu was saying those borders had just broken.

"Forever." On 23 September 2026, after Syria's president told the UN that the Golan "will remain Syrian territory," Defense Minister Israel Katz answered that the Golan is "an integral, eternal part of Israel," that Israel will not withdraw from Mount Hermon and the buffer zone, and that if Israel is attacked from Syria, "any territory we take this time will remain ours forever" (Times of Israel liveblog; World Israel News, 23 September 2026; Zeina Khodr, Al Jazeera, on X).

"Mount Hermon, parts of the north, south, and east." Smotrich again, April 2026: "In Syria, Mount Hermon, parts of the north, south, and east," and "a conclusive political leg in Syria with the Hermon crown and the buffer zone" (video, 9 April 2026; Ynetnews). Knesset member Yitzhak Kroizer: "We should settle in the buffer zone" (video, 22 March 2026).

What Israel's own press saw. Haaretz's editor-in-chief titled his analysis "From Mount Hermon's Peaks, Netanyahu Plots His Vision of a Greater Israel," and wrote that Netanyahu "wants to be remembered as the one who created Greater Israel" (Haaretz, 11 December 2024; quoted by Klarenberg). Four days before Assad fell, the Times of Israel published an op-ed arguing that "Israel's exploding population," projected to reach 15.2 million by 2048, urgently needed "Lebensraum." It was taken down after an outcry (archived copy, as reported by Klarenberg).

What the army has done on the ground​

  • 8 December 2024: Israeli forces crossed into the 1974 buffer zone and took the Syrian summit of Mount Hermon.
  • 10 December 2024: reports put Israeli tanks "only a few kilometres from Damascus" (Afshin Rattansi on X, 10 December 2024), while Israeli jets struck Syrian military sites across the country, destroying what was left of Syria's army.
  • 17 December 2024: Netanyahu stood on the Syrian summit of Hermon, the first sitting Israeli prime minister to enter Syrian territory, and said Israel would stay "until another arrangement can be found" (Times of Israel, 17 December 2024). Religious Israelis held a ceremony on the summit under army protection (Mondoweiss, 17 December 2024).
  • 2025: Israel declared southern Syria south of Damascus a zone the new Syrian army may not enter, citing protection of the Druze minority; Netanyahu ordered forces to prepare to "defend" the Druze suburb of Jaramana on the edge of Damascus (post, 2 March 2025; Afshin Rattansi on X, 17 July 2025). A journalist reported Israeli troops "15 min from Damascus" and influence over Quneitra, Daraa, and Suwayda (Bilal Abdul Kareem on X, 1 September 2025).
  • 2026: Settlers began crossing from the Golan into southern Syria (Truthout on X, 28 April 2026), and Middle East Eye reported "Settler project for 'Greater Israel' sets its eyes on Syria" (Middle East Eye, 3 July 2026). In September 2026 the Israeli journalist Elizabeth Tsurkov published a Haaretz investigation of the Israeli occupation of southern Syria based on dozens of interviews with residents, released detainees, and Israeli soldiers (Elizabeth Tsurkov on X, 25 September 2026).

Go deeper: Mount Hermon: "the eyes of the State of Israel" · The southern Syria buffer zone and the Druze

The Iran connection​

Syria is where the Greater Israel story and the Iran war meet. The day before Assad fell, Israel's government said it "will not allow Syria to return to being dominated by Iranian forces or their militias, and will not permit the revival of Hezbollah operations" (statement posted 7 December 2024). Two months earlier the English account of Channel 14, the pro-government network that calls itself "Israel's leading news channel," laid out the order of operations: "given that Iran shares no border with Israel and is not a hindrance to the establishment of Greater Israel, Israel should focus on Syria before starting the war with Iran" (C14 News English on X, 2 October 2024). That is what happened: Syria first, in December 2024; Iran next, in June 2025 and again from February 2026. See Iran.

Syria's answer and the region's alarm​

Syria's new president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, began by promising no conflict: "We do not want any conflict whether with Israel or anyone else," while insisting Israel "has to pull back to its previous positions" (Middle East Monitor, 31 December 2024). Within three months he said, "There are expansionist intentions of the Israeli occupation in Syria" (Levant24 on X, 4 March 2025). By October 2025 he was saying Israel seeks "to seek regional domination and establish a 'Greater Israel'" (video caption, Xumas on X, 15 October 2025). At the UN in September 2026: "We reject the permanent Israeli attempts to impose a fait accompli in Syria," and "Our Golan will remain our territory, according to all UNSC resolutions" (Zeina Khodr on X; Charles Lister on X). He told President Trump, as one account summarized it, that Washington cannot give away land that is not America's to give (post, 23 September 2026).

Turkey's President Erdoğan, whose country borders Syria, told his party on 10 June 2026: "The attacks by Netanyahu and his crime network against Syria and Lebanon have reached a point that threatens not only these two sister countries, but now also Turkiye. Turkiye's security begins not only in Hatay, but also in Aleppo, Damascus, and Beirut... We are well aware of the ultimate goal of the 'Greater Israel' illusion. With God's help, we will never allow this to happen" (The Cradle on X, 10 June 2026). Jordan's King Abdullah told the UN in September 2026 that "today's Syria is the warning that the international community chooses not to see," describing "repeated incursions, gradual territorial expansion, and the imposition of new facts on the ground, including around vital water sources" (post, 23 September 2026).

The American part​

Washington said in December 2024, through Jake Sullivan and Antony Blinken, that it "will make sure that Israel's presence in Syria doesn't become permanent" (Mondoweiss, 17 December 2024). Two years later the Israeli defense minister says "forever." In 2019 the United States became the only country to recognize Israel's annexation of the Golan (WikiLeaks on X, 21 March 2019). Malaysia's former prime minister Mahathir Mohamad said of the buffer-zone seizure: "This is a part of the Greater Israel project. And the U.S will be behind this scheme" (Mahathir on X, 17 December 2024). A Brookings scholar wrote in Foreign Affairs that the incoming Trump administration "will surely take a permissive approach to Israeli territorial ambitions" (Suzanne Maloney, as quoted by Klarenberg). A former CIA counterterrorism officer told RT in March 2026: "Blatant reason for Syrian, Iranian wars is a thing called Greater Israel... It's never going to stop... The president, for whatever reason, signed on to that. It's a disaster for US" (RT on X, 19 March 2026).

Evidence rating: CONFIRMED that Israel took and holds Mount Hermon and the Syrian buffer zone and that its defense minister says it will not leave. CONFIRMED that Israel's finance minister has said Jerusalem is destined "to expand to Damascus." STRONG that the Syria moves were the planned step before the war on Iran.

Status: Bezalel Smotrich, Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel Katz, Yitzhak Kroizer, Ahmed al-Sharaa, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, King Abdullah II, Elizabeth Tsurkov, Mahathir Mohamad, Jake Sullivan, Antony Blinken, and Suzanne Maloney are alive. Nothing on this page states that any living person committed a crime.

Sources​

Research captures: twitter/t24__v277.md through twitter/t24__v288.md

Last Updated: 2026-09-26

Last updated on