Golan Heights - Syrian Villages

Syrian Villages

According to most estimates, the population of the entire area prior to the 1967 Six Day War ranged from between 130,000–145,000. This included 17,000 Palestinian refugees registered with UNRWA. Between 80,000 and 130,000 Syrians fled or were driven from the heights during the Six-Day War and around 7,000 remained in the Israeli-held territory in six villages: Majdal Shams, Mas'ade, Buq'ata, Ein Qiniyye, Ghajar and Shayta.

Israel demolished over one hundred Syrian villages and farms in the Golan Heights. After the demolitions, the lands were given to Israeli settlers.

Quneitra was the biggest city in the Golan Heights until 1967, housing some 27,000 people. The city came under Israeli control on the last day of the Six-Day War and was handed back to Syrian civil control per the 1974 Disengagement Agreement. But the Israelis had destroyed Quneitra with dynamite and bulldozers before they withdrew from the city. East of the 1973 ceasefire line, in the Syrian controlled part of the Golan Heights, an area of 600 km², are more than 40 Syrian towns and villages, including Quneitra, Khan Arnabah, Alhameedia, Alrafeed, Alsamdaneea, Almudareea, Beer Ajam, Barika, Gadeer Albustan, Hadar, Juba, Kodana, Ofanya, Rwaiheena, Nabe’ Alsakher, Trinja, Umm Ale’zam, and Umm batna. The population of the Quneitra Governorate numbers 79,000, and the Syrian population in the Israeli-occupied portion consists of 20 000 people.

In the late 1970s, the Israeli government offered all non-Israelis living in the Golan citizenship, but at present, fewer than 10% of the Druze are Israeli citizens; the remainder hold Syrian citizenship. The Golan Alawites in the village of Ghajar accepted Israeli citizenship in 1981.