August 9, 1999
The Druse of Golan Stay Loyal to Syria
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By JOEL GREENBERG
AJDAL SHAMS, Golan Heights -- Lining up among the tents pitched
in the apple orchards of this mountain village, the Druse children
belted out their summer camp cheer as two Syrian flags fluttered
overhead.
"Syria! Syria! Syria!" they shouted, fists raised, as morning
fog lifted from Majdal Shams, at the foot of Mount Hermon on the
northern edge of the Israeli-held Golan Heights. "Golan, Golan,
Golan! Withdrawal, withdrawal, withdrawal!"
The cry was for an Israeli withdrawal from the Golan, a
strategic plateau captured from Syria in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war
and annexed by Israel in 1981.
Withdrawal -- "al-jalaa" in Arabic -- is in fact the name of the
pro-Syrian summer camp here where more than 300 youngsters spent 10
days of patriotic fervor, within sight of Syria and under
occasional surveillance by the Israeli authorities.
As Israel and Syria gingerly feel their way toward a possible
renewal of peace talks broken off three years ago, Syrian
nationalist sentiment is running high among many of the 18,000
Druse who live in four villages in the Golan Heights.
Members of an offshoot from Islam that numbers about 400,000 in
Syria, Lebanon, Israel and Jordan, the Druse in Golan are
contemplating the prospect of a return of their villages to Syrian
control. Syria is demanding an Israeli withdrawal as the price of
peace, and the Druse villages may well be the first areas handed
over if a treaty is signed.
Although they have enjoyed relative prosperity under Israeli
rule while Syria's economy has struggled, few Druse will say they
prefer what is widely viewed here as a foreign occupation.
"The economic situation comes and goes, but your homeland comes
first," said Zeid Aweidat, a grocer in Majdal Shams. "Just
because you drive a Mercedes doesn't mean you abandon your poor
mother."
At Camp Withdrawal, now in its eighth season, Syrian patriotism
and Arab solidarity were flaunted openly, in defiance of the
Israelis. Two Syrian flags and a Palestinian banner flew in the
middle of the encampment, tents bore names of cities and ancient
sites in Syria and a surrounding fence was covered with posters
made by campers celebrating "Arab Syrian Golan."
The camp T-shirt bore a map of the Arab world and the words:
"My homeland, no matter how long forgotten. Thousands have come to
occupy it, but they will melt away like the snow."
Along with sports, music, art and outings to a swimming pool,
the camp offered field trips to ruins of Golan villages that were
emptied when Israel captured the area in 1967. Dozens of villages
were destroyed in the aftermath of the fighting.
Campers were told about the history and geography of Syria and
regaled with tales of famous battles like Saladdin's 12th-century
campaigns against the Crusaders and the Battle of Maithalun in
1920, when Syrian nationalists fought French troops who marched on
Damascus.
Ayman Abu Jabal, 33, a director of the camp, said it was set up
to counter the Israeli-controlled curriculum of schools on the
Golan Heights, where Druse children learn Hebrew as well as Arabic
and Middle Eastern history devoid of Arab nationalist content.
"Israel is trying to turn them into Israelis, and we reject
that," Abu Jabal said. "We want to teach our children that we
have a homeland, a nation, a people that we're very proud of."
That nation is Syria, not Israel, and the people are Arab, not
Druse, said Fawzi Abu Jabal, 45, another camp director, who served
10 years in jail for spying for Syria.
"We are Syrian Arabs living under Israeli occupation," he
said. "We're part of the Arab nation. There is no Druse people
with a separate history. That disinformation is spread by Israel,
to divide and rule."
The campers, who included a few Israeli Arabs and Palestinians
from East Jerusalem, clearly got the message.
"We learned to love our homeland, defend our nation and hate
Zionism," said Badia Sabra, a 13-year-old boy from the Druse
village of Masadeh.
Khaled Abu Shahin, 14, from the neighboring village of Buqata,
said that after three summers at the camp, his perspective on
Israel had changed. Visiting the ruins of a village destroyed after
the 1967 war made him feel that "Israel is unjust," he recalled
in the eloquent Hebrew he learned in school.
"When I saw it, I couldn't believe the Israelis could be so
harsh," Khaled said. "I had thought they were good. Now I believe
that only our people are good for us. We want to return to Syria
and live with our true people, like our grandparents did."
The yearning for Syria is not only political. The Golan Druse
have relatives in Syria from whom they have been separated for
years by the mines and fences along the dividing line.
Not far from the summer camp, across what is called here the
Valley of Tears, members of the divided Abu Salah clan, living on
both sides of the fence, used megaphones to console each other
after the death of a relative in Syria.
Dressed in traditional black, with white headdresses, the Abu
Salahs from Majdal Shams took turns greeting relatives clustered on
the opposite hill in Syrian territory.
"How are you?" said an old woman in a white kerchief,
listening for the reply wafting over the valley. "Sister, we
console you from here. We hope we'll meet soon."
Nahi Abu Salah, grieving for her uncle, sang a lament and a plea
for the fences to come down. "If only I could have been with you,
even at your funeral," she chanted into the megaphone as women
wept beside her. "Let the missing return. Have mercy on us. Let a
mother see her long-lost son."
