Looking North with Lieutenant Colonel Sarit Zehavi of the Alma Center

Disclaimer: This transcript is an edited version version of a transcript created using AI technology and may not reflect 100% accuracy.

The video can be found here.

Sarah: Good afternoon and welcome to yet another extremely compelling and in-depth look at the latest events of what’s going on in the Middle East. As you recall in early December, the forces of Bashar al-Assad, whose Alawite family had ruled over Syria for over 50 years, fled Syria, leaving it in the hands of former Al-Qaeda and ISIS member, Ahmed al-Sharaa, whose Hayat Tahrir al-Sham party has strong ties to Turkey. Many in the diplomatic and international community have had high hopes for Ahmed al-Sharaa, whose nom de guerre had been Mahad al-Jualani.

Images have been flashing across our screens in recent days of Bedouins and members of the Syrian government forces humiliating members of the Druze minority group in the Suwayda province. An independent monitor says more than 100 Druze have been killed in the fighting. The new government has sent in forces to quell the fighting. Apparently, there’s been a long standing suspicion among the Druze of the surrounding Bedouins in the area for many years. This is beginning to break down along sectarian lines, and the new government in Syria is trying to project its authority. The Druze have a great deal of distrust of a government which is largely dominated by Islamists.

In Israel, we have a Druze community that’s approximately 1.6% of the total population, comprising about 150,000 people. The Israeli Druze have been extremely loyal soldiers to the state of Israel, and there are cemeteries full of graves where they have given their lives in defense of the Jewish state. Recent reports indicate that Israeli Druze have tried to cross the border over into Syria to protect their Syrian brethren, and that in the last several days the Israeli Air Force has begun targeting areas north of Damascus and Suwayda.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says his country is acting to defend the Druze minority and to create a buffer zone. Unfortunately, civilian bodies have begun to pile up. There have been reported arson attacks and looting. Within the Israeli cabinet, we have had an array of strong opinions about Ahmed al-Sharaa. Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli went so far as to call for Ahmed al-Sharaa to be eliminated “without delay”.

Meanwhile, in Lebanon, the IDF has been hard at work bombing the Radwan forces of Hezbollah, dismantling weapons depots, terror hubs and tunnels in the Beqaa Valley to prevent Hezbollah from establishing a self there.

There is no better person, I think, in the planet who knows the issues of what is happening just north of Israel’s borders than our dear friend Sarit Zehavi. Lieutenant Colonel Sarit Zehavi is the founder and president of Alma, a nonprofit and independent research and education center specializing in Israel’s security challenges on its northern border. Sarit has briefed hundreds and hundreds of groups and forums, ranging from U.S. Senators, congressmen and women, politicians, to senior journalists and visiting VIP groups in Israel and overseas. Sarit scripts numerous position papers and updates focusing on Lebanon, Syria, and Israel’s national security challenges. She served for 15 years in the IGF specializing in military intelligence, holds an MA in Middle Eastern Studies from Ben-Gurion University, and is also a member of Forum Dvorah, promoting the equal representation of women in key decision-making positions in the fields of national security and foreign policy.

I have had the pleasure of accompanying Sarit on some of her many visits to Capitol Hill, and she is a treasure trove of information. Her unique achievements has led her to be selected by the Jerusalem Post as one of the top 50 most influential Jews of 2021. Sarit lives with her family in the Western Galilee. Please, Sarit, if you can help us shed some sunlight of what is going on in Syria first, that would really be a tremendous help to all of us.

Sarit Zehavi: First, thank you very much for this opening. I think everything you said about the current situation is very accurate, and we are picking our words to try to describe what’s going on because there is a lot of disinformation around. I want to start actually from a little bit of a personal note here since I live up north and I have many Druze neighbors.

When we had a meeting here at the Alma Center on Monday morning, we saw the first reports coming out that there were riots between the Bedouin Sunnis and the Druze in southern Syria, and I asked my staff, okay, when should I expect all the roads in the north to be blocked, and it happened just the next day in the morning. Part of the Israeli decision to join this and to defend the Druze of Syria are deriving from the very prominent and central stance of the Druze in Israel, even though, as you mentioned, they are a very small community in Israel, they are very influential. Last time there were riots between the Druze and the jihadi forces of al-Jolani, they blocked the roads and they did it again now. It means that all of northern Israel is basically blocked and we couldn’t travel. The roads were just shut down, the police didn’t open them, it just directed drivers to alternative roads, which means many hours on the roads, Israel is a small country, you don’t have too many options.

This is a little bit of sharing with you the implications of our daily lives here that people hardly know when we speak about what’s happening in Syria, and so just to share this small note with you.

I want us to start from something very basic that it’s important for me to emphasize. This is not just riots between two militias or two types of militias in Syria, Sunni, Al-Jolani affiliated militias or Al-Sharaa, whatever you want to name him, and the Druze militias, it’s actually between two ideologies. Okay. Those guys who attacked the Druze in southern Syria are jihadists, are radical jihadists. In one of the pictures I saw one of them with a patch here of Al-Qaeda or of ISIS, I don’t know, one of them. Those jihadists believe that the Druze are infidels. This means that they believe that the Druze should be not only humiliated, as you saw in the videos, but actually should be executed, that they should be fought against, and I think this is the base to understand why Israel had to rush and help, why there is such a bold demand from the… Israel drew its leadership from the State of Israel to come and help, but even though everything I’ve just said, the reality is even much more complicated than that, and I want to drill down to all the details for you to understand.

The first thing I want to say is that surprisingly enough, we have three different opinions Among the Druze in Syria. We can identify four leaders here that two of them are saying, you know what, Al-Golani won the civil war, he is now the president of Syria. We should try to integrate, and that’s the best way to defend the Druze sect. By the way, that’s the traditional way to defend the Druze sect, to always be loyal to the government. That’s the stance with all the risks that I’ve just talked about, but we cannot ignore that this position exists among the Druze of Syria.

Another position is by another leader named Jaber Boua, who is saying, we should fight Al-Golani since what I’ve just said about his Jihadi forces, but this is an internal issue of Syria, Israel should not interfere in this.

The third one is El-Hidri, who is saying, no, we should fight him, he is a true threat to the Jews of Syria, and I am calling Israel and international forces, whoever they are, to cross the border, join us and defend us.

Three different opinions around one issue, while the leader of the Jews in Israel, who wants to position himself as the leader of the Druze period, not only in Israel, is calling Israel to get involved and calling his own people, the Druze of Israel, to cross the border and join the fightings. Okay. This is just from the Druze point of view.

Basically, from putting all of that together, the Israeli government made a promise and that’s why we didn’t have a choice. We made a promise a few months ago that we will defend the Druze minority in Syria if it will be attacked, and this promise was made due to our commitment to the Druze of Israel that we will help their brothers and sisters in Syria, and it was important for us to send a clear message that we are doing that. As you said, the Druze of Israel are partners here and our relationship with them are very important. The dilemma in Israel was how to assist them with maximum effect and minimum risks, and you understand that it’s all choosing between a bad option to a bad option here. Minimum risks internationally, but minimum risk also to Israeli forces, and that’s why the decision was made not to send ground forces into Syria, not to send IDF brigades or divisions into Syria for now, at least, but to act by the Air Force. By the way, before the Air Force, during those months since February, we do assist them with humanitarian aid, with making the connections closer between the Druze of Israel and the Druze of Syria, with visits of Sheikh of Sheikhmin clerics, Druze’s clerics that came to Israel to visit holy sites. Yes, there are holy sites in Israel also for the Druze sect. We did some things to become closer to the Druzes of Syria and to assist them in those months between the two incidents and also before the first one.

The airstrikes were against the forces in Suwayda, meaning in the Druze area that was attacked. Strict attacks against the forces, the jihadi forces were attacking the Druze, but also strikes against what we call symbols of government in Syria in order to send a clear message to Ahmed al-Sharaa that he is responsible. He is saying he is responsible, fine, he is responsible. The most prominent attack was today against the center of the military leadership in Syria, the headquarters of the military leadership in Syria. It was not completely destroyed, we know how to completely destroy these kind of buildings, as clearly you’ve seen, but there are casualties there, and we took a huge risk in this, but it was needed to send a clear message that Al-Sharaa is responsible. In Suwayda area, we attacked roads and convoys of those forces to prevent any reinforcement in weapons and manpower. I myself think that we should focus on capabilities, focus on direct prevention rather than attacking those symbols of government, even though I do understand why we had done that.

I was asked today, and I believe the audience is asking as well, like we had negotiations for peace agreement with Syria only yesterday, and today we woke up with kind of war, how these two are related. I believe that, look, the reality here is extreme, it’s like mind-blowing in a sense that we want to end all wars and all of a sudden we got another war here and another front to fight, what is happening to the Druze of Syria is truly a tragedy, it doesn’t matter what the numbers are, but if there is a little bit of light in all of that, it’s actually with regard to the negotiations, and I want to explain because what is happening now is exemplify very, very clearly the Israeli security needs.

Because of something that is completely internally Syrian, we are facing a complexity with our borders, with our fronts, and we don’t want that. If anybody needed any proof of why it’s important to disarm southern Syria and to make sure there is an effective buffer zone, now everybody understands that. This is one positive implication of the negotiations, especially when we think about the American [inaudible]. With regard to Al-Golani himself, I think that what he learned from that, I hope that this is what he learned from that, is that Israel has red lines, we have security needs, and we’re not going to give up on them. Maybe what is now happening is actually putting Israel in a better position with regard to the negotiation that will enable us to get a better agreement, because I must tell you that in all the past months, and especially after Trump and Al-Golani meeting, I was very much willing for peace. I always said that I will be on the first bus to Damascus because my father was born there, but at the same time, I was very much worried about the price that Israel may pay for this agreement because Al-Golani demanded that we will get out of the buffer zone and that they will stop the attacks in Syria, and what do we get in return other than some kind of a nice statement or a security cooperation with somebody that we are not sure whether is a true jihadist or he just doesn’t control his jihadist militias, I don’t think there is a difference. In both cases it’s a problem.

That’s why I think that what is now happening clarifies and exemplifies very clearly to the Americans that no, we cannot just take off the sanctions, sign a peace agreement, and there will be magical peace in the Middle East. Things are much more complicated, and it’s truly important to make sure that Al-Golani militias are respecting the minorities in Syria, and that Al-Golani truly controls these radical militias because I truly doesn’t know what’s going on in his head, all I know that he is Al-Qaeda leader in Syria, that he’s a true radical believer, he’s part of the ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood, and whether he’s following the Saudi or the UAE model or following ISIS model, I don’t know.

Interviewer: That is a wonderful summary. I have to tell you that I am of the trust but verify school of thought, and it’s only been six or seven months since Al-Golani has gained control of Damascus, and we are looking at the price, w’re looking at where he came from. Once you’re a part of al-Qaeda or ISIS, does one put on a suit and tie and just shed their ideology? I think, a lot of people have made the same mistake over and over again when it comes to Middle East foreign policy since Oslo. They are so anxious for peace, and they’re, of course, we are all sick and tired of war, of course, you ask any people who are in the IDF and all of the reservists who’ve serve for 300, 400, 500 days, they’re exhausted. yet we cannot be so war weary that we rush into things and what is the price, I think Al-Golani wants at least a third of the Golan Heights. I cannot see Prime Minister Netanyahu as long as he remains prime minister, which is a whole other question, but I can’t see him agreeing to that. I think that is part of the buffer zone that Israel really requires and right now there have been people and Muthula and all sorts of northern communities that are still not feeling safe going back, and we saw that President Trump immediately took away the sanctions on Syria, so we can’t rush into things. I believe we have to give it some more time. Who are some of the militia that Al-Golani has brought in to fight for him?

Sarit: Look, the militias are composed of his people during the civil war of HTS [inaudible], which is just a different name for Al-Qaeda because they had to skip sanctions and they had to rebuild their image, and during the civil war, they changed names a few times. Probably some people from ISIS joined to those militias as well. We also saw that Al-Golani incorporated into the Syrian army now. Foreigners, not Syrians, foreigners that have been fighting in Syria on behalf of these radical Sunni’s ideologies in the past decade, and he gave them citizenship. They became Syrians now, even though they are Pakistanis. Talistani or Afghani or Checheni or I don’t know what, and you can see them down, they don’t even look Syrian.

I want to just to touch upon one last point with regard to the issue of the Druze here. What happened today and yesterday evening, it started yesterday evening, is that the fence, there is a very impressive fence between Israel and Syria in one specific point where you have a Druze town right on the border from the Syrian side of the border and another Druze town on the other side in the distance of about two kilometers, maybe less, the fence was breached very easily, and in a gradual, like 24 hours, 1,000 Druze from Israel crossed into Syria. Most of them are probably from the Golan. It means that most of them are probably not Israeli citizens, but they are part of the state of Israel since 1967. There are also Israeli citizens, Jews of the Gali that crossed. It means that we are now sending officers to bring them back, even though they are not getting deep into Syria just next to the fence, this is risking our forces to bring them back. They went to the Syrian side, to a Druze town on the Syrian side, as I’ve mentioned, less than two kilometers from the border, which used to collaborate with Hezbollah during the civil war. Okay. This is where they had dinner yesterday and lunch today, and from there they have to drive 60 kilometers to Suwayda, to the south, in order to help the Druze over there. In those 60 kilometers, we have radical Sunnis that are waiting to kill them, and I am not sure that we will be able to pull them out and to rescue them if they will be attacked by those jihadists or wars, kidnapped by those jihadists. It’s a lot of people, it’s really a problem, and the Israeli government called them not to cross, not to go there, they were not sent by the Israeli government, they did that because the Druze leaders in Israel called them to do so, and they are just risking their lives. I don’t see how they are going to make a difference in those battles, so you see, this is like a complication on top of another complication here.

Interviewer: [inaudible] Religion is a very mystical, secretive religion, kind of broken off from Shia Islam, and I know they show allegiance to whatever country they’re in. Part of me understands and appreciates the Israeli action to try to help the Druze citizens of Israel, yet many of these Druzes had been loyal members of Syria, so there’s a dilemma here. Could you help explain how much of the Israel Armed Forces and ammunition and power is it worth it for Israel to invest to help the Druzes?

Sarit: I think that what we had done until now with regard to the airstrikes and also with regard to the humanitarian aid that was transferred to Syria in the past few months is helpful. As we speak, there is a ceasefire there, we don’t know how long it’s going to last, whether 24 hours or 24 days or 24 months, we don’t know. As I’ve said, I think that the only way to do it is to analyze capabilities and to neutralize capabilities of those militias. We had done that, but not completely, and I believe we need more time to understand where those militias are, where their bases are, how do we do that. We targeted some of the main roads to block them from coming into Suwayda, et cetera. As I’ve said, I think that it was important for us to interfere, but we had to be very specific with what exactly we are doing and how we are doing that.

Interviewer: Right. Okay. People have asked, do not the entanglements with Turkey under Erdogan, the Islamists and Qatar outweigh the red line of no military encroachments below Damascus, are we feeling, especially since Al Gurani has these strong attachments to Erdogan, Turkey.

Sarit: I don’t have enough information about the Qatari involvement currently in Syria. Clearly there is a collaboration between Qatar and Turkey and around that, but I don’t have enough specific information. As for Turkey, Turkey was the one who equipped and trained and supported economically the whole northern district of Syria where Al Gurani was actually stuck in with other rebels groups for a few years since the rebels lost in Syria in 2018, which enabled him to control this area with the Turkish assistance, and then when Assad became weak to launch the campaign and actually win a war that was not won for 15 years, win it in three days. Part of the key to this success was the Turkish, not all of it, but part of it was the Turkish support in these places.

Turkey is trying to adopt or to bear hug Syria with establishing military presence and bases, yet I cannot say that we’ve seen massive convoys of weapons other than what we have seen in the past years, because there is Turkish presence in Syria, in the north, in the Kurdish areas, like to create a buffer zone between the Turkish border and Syria in the Kurdish areas. There are areas that we know for a few years that Turkey is there, it’s a Turkish affiliated area, but if you ask me whether they already got boots on the ground in Damascus in massive ways, I’m not sure we are there yet, I believe they want to be there. Erdogan views himself as the new emperor. not as a ruler of Turkey, but definitely as creating Turkey as an area of influence, it’s creating Syria as an area of influence for Turkey, and this is a problem since if Iran was the radical Shiites, no doubt that Erdogan today is leading a line of radical Sunnis, which I’m not surprised, but those who know Erdogan shouldn’t be surprised, but no doubt that his expressions became more and more radicalized in the past few months, comparing to what we’ve seen in the past, and yet, everything we’ve seen in the past was radical as well. Okay, this is what I’m trying to say.

Interviewer: Right. That’s why for me, we have got to wait before jumping into bed with negotiations with Syria, because we’ve heard, we know Erdoğan wants to create a foothold in Syria, and he has had horrific comments like first Damascus, then Jerusalem, he’s compared Prime Minister Netanyahu to Hitler. We’re very happy that this Iranian corridor has been cut off yet, are we trading the devil for Satan, we’re not really sure.

Sarit: Look, I am saying that it’s even worse because if this satan will decide within a few years to go against us, we will face western weapon, not old Russian, Iranian weapon, and we will face western technologies. That’s why I’ve said I want to see normalization with Syria or any signs of normalization that we’re talking about the security agreement, fine, I’m for all of that. I think it is realistic to do it, especially because Trump is a full power on that, and I appreciate those efforts, but I just say that we need to make sure that Syria is not developing capabilities that can threaten the state of Israel in the future.

I think that the fact that Turkey is a member of NATO is actually an advantage, it’s not a disadvantage and I will explain why. Since we are not, I’m saying that as an Israeli, we are not interested in fighting Turkey, we have enough fronts, as I’ve said, we are already fighting seven fronts, we are interested to find a way to bring Turkey back to what it used to be for us. The only way to bring it back in light of the fact that its leader is totally not at the same page, is NATO. That’s the leverage of pressure that we have to make sure that Turkey is not going to a very problematic direction of supporting terror against Israel, et cetera. That’s the only way. The problem is this leverage is not being activated.

Interviewer: Exactly. I haven’t seen any evidence that NATO has done anything to try to rein in Erdogan and Turkey as they’re going off in the direction of the Muslim brotherhood, and hopefully, inshallah, there will be free and fair elections, but I don’t see that happening. We need another Ataturk revolution in Turkey [inaudible]. Let’s turn now to Lebanon. I know a tremendous amount has been done by the IDF to clean up Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, and certainly we saw beeper and pager instance of September 2024. Where is Hezbollah right now, are they regrouping?

Sarit: Yes, Hezbollah is completely invested in the project of reconstruction. When I’m saying reconstruction, I talk of three main fields. The first one is military and operational, meaning that they are trying to go back south, they are trying to rebuild their positions and capabilities against Israel in southern Lebanon, in the UN area of operation, in the area that’s supposed to be free of any illegal weapon, in an area that the Lebanese Armed Forces supposed to disarm Hezbollah, and actually also in other areas.

Israel had carried out more than 450 attacks only since the ceasefire, only since November. Air strikes, I’m talking only on air strikes. IDF also admitted that we had some special forces raids next to the border. All of that in order to prevent the violations of Hezbollah. Whenever we identify either a movement of military operatives or a new weapon depot or storage, we attack it. Now, there is a mechanism that if we identify a violation, we should reported to the mechanism, to the Americans and French, they are asking the Lebanese Army to deal with it. The Lebanese Army deals with it or doesn’t deal with it, sometimes yes, sometimes no, 50-50. When the Lebanese Army is not doing anything or when we don’t have time to wait for the mechanism to work because the operatives are just there, we are acting ourselves. If we are doing that on a daily basis, and I can tell you that I was on the Lebanese border this morning and I heard the blasts on a daily basis, it means that the mechanism is working in a very insufficient way, and I’m trying to be diplomatic. It is working in a sense that it is enabling a dialogue that we do see, or multi-log, that we do see a little bit of activity of the Lebanese Armed Forces, it is not working in a sense that there is a long distance between the promise of disarming Hezbollah in South Lebanon and the current situation.

The second field of reconstruction of Hezbollah is smuggling of weapons. Only in the past month, Al Gurani, the bad guy that we just talked about, stopped three times smuggling of weapons from Syria into Lebanon. Actually, he provided more proofs of Hezbollah reconstruction with regard to weapons than the Lebanese Armed Forces that are saying that they found 500 weapons storages in Lebanon. Where are those 500, I don’t know. Israel attacked drones sites in Beirut, only again the past few months, drone sites in Beirut, missile sites, smuggling, the head of the smuggling unit, in the Baka next to the border with Syria and Lebanon.

The third level is financial. They have a lot of difficulties in this. The Lebanese government is working, the Hariri Airport is no longer under the control of Hezbollah. It is trying to smuggle money, but some of it is being caught, probably not all of it, but some of it is being caught. Yesterday there was a statement in Lebanon, which I hope it’s true, we still need to see, to wait and see, that the Lebanese bank will no longer work with Hezbollah’s banks, this is huge. I’ve been talking about it for many years, and especially in the past few months, that it’s unheard of that the Hezbollah banks are still active in Lebanon. There is more to be done with regard to the civilian array or the civilian branch of Hezbollah, if Lebanese government will succeed in replacing the civilian infrastructure of Hezbollah with state infrastructures, this means gasoline stations, supermarkets, ambulances, medical, pharmacies, schools, youth organizations, all these huge infrastructure of Hezbollah that is actually buying the support of its own base, if this will be replaced by the government, there is a hope that something will change. As long as we are dealing with Lebanese army took 500 storages or not, it’s just not going to solve the bigger problem.

Interviewer: Right. Lebanon has this confessional system and Hezbollah still seems to control a lot of the government, and last week, or maybe it was earlier this week, Joseph Aoun said he did not want a peace with Israel. How do you evaluate this, how much control does Hezbollah still have, and even though it looks like the Lebanese Armed Forces and the Lebanese government are trying to wrest control away from Hezbollah.

Sarit: Lebanese government is very good in speaking, talking and less in their deeds. As I’ve said, we see more deeds. I am trying not to be impressed by any statements, positive or negative, okay, I’m trying to measure the deeds and with the deeds, as I’ve said, they had done, it’s better than it used to be, but it’s not enough and there is more to be done. I can give you two negative examples, one is the fact that the Lebanese president, which you mentioned, nominated an advisor for the reconstruction of the damages of the war in Lebanon. It means that a lot of money, international money, is now coming into Lebanon. Who is going to handle the money, who is going to distribute the money to the constructors, I don’t know, but the advisor that was nominated for this issue by the president used to be Hezbollah minister in the previous Lebanese government, and he was the one who was responsible for Hariri Airport and was the one that enabled all those smuggling of weapons and money through Hariri Airport. I want to make sure that this guy is completely away of the political system in Lebanon rather than becoming the special advisor for the president.

When the government was established a few months ago, after many months that Lebanon actually didn’t have an elected government, they promised the Americans, the Prime Minister, Nawaf Salam, promised the American envoy Oltaqos that Hezbollah will not be part of the government, but actually all ministers of this government were nominated. They are not politicians, but they were all nominated by the different parties in the coalition. Two ministers were nominated by Hezbollah. It’s like one step forward, two step backwards, and we need to be hands-on to make sure that there is enough maximum pressure on the Lebanese government going in the right direction.

In the past week, there were a lot of publications in Lebanon about a discussion between the Americans and the Lebanese of a deadline, which is also phenomenal. I was talking about it for so long that Israel had a deadline to withdraw from Lebanon after this war, there was no deadline for the disarmament of Hezbollah. I want these two to be linked, I want to make sure that Israel is complete, if Israel is completely withdrawing from Lebanon, which today we have five positions, hills, company size positions, in the Lebanese side of the border. If we have to withdraw from those five hills that we are actually protecting our communities next to the border, Hezbollah is completely disarmed in South Lebanon and we are far from there, which is not there.

Interviewer: Right. I know that we had an earlier webinar where I showed you some pictures that my son-in-law took of the rocket missile launchers and truckloads and truckloads that he and his fellow IDF soldiers took from inside bedrooms where there were these benign little pictures of Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck and everyone was saying, no, no, no, we’re no weapons here, so we don’t know how the job is going to be done. I know that the IDF has been working incredibly hard and, as you say, one step forward, two backwards, so when do you feel the people who are living close to the border with either Lebanon or Syria will feel comfortable going back to their homes?

Sarit: Let’s start from the Lebanese, it’s two different stories. Let’s start from the Lebanese in Israeli border. There we had 60,000 Israelis who were evacuated. Last March, the educational system was open in those places and attracting the Israelis to come back. We had 60% that came back, but in different amount in each community, you had communities of 100% and communities of 10%. Okay. Today the school year ended two weeks ago, it means that more people are coming back during the summer, so I don’t know what’s the numbers like specifically today, probably more than 60%. I think that the true test would be within a few months if we will see people selling the houses, because remember, people are coming back because they don’t have any alternative economically. The compensation were stopped, they cannot pay two mortgage. How many will sell the houses? It’s a question. Yet, and I’m saying that from the most personal point of view, many people want to go and live in those places, many Israelis want to go and live in those places while we don’t have new neighborhoods there. It’s going to take a long time until we’ll be able to establish new neighborhoods there, but people want to buy houses in those places because Israelis understand that we need to settle next to borders if we want to defend the state of Israel. This is part of our existence, and I think this is a Zionist value that now we are reliving, we’re reviving again, and it’s really impressive to see this spirit among Israelis that really want to come and actually replace those who are afraid and want to leave, which I totally understand as well. I can tell you that we feel that the situation on the Israel-Lebanon border is the safest it’s ever been comparing to previous years because really Hezbollah has a lot of difficulties in coming back. Is it going to stay like that, that’s why I’m here. I want to make sure that It stays like that. With the Syrian border, it’s a huge question, and we should wait and see how things are developing, and definitely what is happening in the past 24 hours is really troubling for so many reasons.

Interviewer: All right. We’ve had a number of questions from the audience. One is, is the announcement that the PKK leader is telling his group to stand down true and what would that impact be on Israel?

Sarit: It has nothing to do with Israel. PKK disarmament, it’s the first time that I actually saw them handing their weapons, but the PKK is not the main organization. This organization mainly was active in Turkey, against Turkey, the main leading Kurdish organization in Syria, is the SDF, the Syrian Democratic Forces, and they signed an agreement with El Golani, and there the question is still standing whether they are going to be completely disarmed, handing their weapons and being distributed anywhere in the Syrian army, or which is more likely, they will keep their organic units and just be saying, okay, we are recognizing the sovereignty of the Syrian state, it’s a huge difference between the two, and this is something that is a little bit missed in the West because when they see an agreement, they immediately believe that everything is solved and it’s not exactly the situation.

Interviewer: We got a very interesting question speaking about the SDF. Tom Barrack, the US Special Envoy to Syria and Turkey, is pushing this agreement between the SDF and the Syrian Army, does he understand who the Salafi Islamic jihadist forces are within the Syrian army, and how can the SDF work with that?

Sarit: I don’t know if he, like, I don’t know. I didn’t try the profile of Thomas Barrack, so I don’t know.

Interviewer: Right. It is really a hodgepodge of different ethnicities, as is Lebanon, but Syria is also, and like this Mosaic of some very good minority groups, some Amerinite Christians and both some the Alawites, I think, are being brutalized, and we can understand the years and years of resentment because the Assad family was Alawite, but who is next? Is this going to be like dominoes from one ethnic group to another that Golani’s forces are going to show their wrath against, I don’t know, but when you see some of those pictures, you see the pictures of the humiliation people having their beard shaved and humiliated.

Sarit: Not beards. They were okay. Those radicals believe that beards should be long and mustaches should be shaved, the Druze believe that the mustache is a symbol of honor and respect, and that’s why shaving the mustaches of the Druze is a symbol of humiliation. By the way, when they did that, they were not very gentle and people were cut and it’s a very violent pictures to see shaving those beards by those jihadists. Syria is a state of, it was supposed to be a confederation, confederation of minorities. When the civil war started, we were in a situation of 50% Sunnis and 50% divided between different minorities, Christians, Alawites, Shiites, Druze, whatever. The civil war probably changed that, and we don’t know exactly the numbers, how the numbers are today, but it is clear that the fact that Assad came from a minority gave a little bit of confidence to the minorities. A little bit. Now the balance of power is changed, but what didn’t change is that Syria is a failed state and El-Golani has a long way to go to establish a sovereign state there. The biggest question is at what price for the minorities?

Interviewer: Exactly. I mean, those pictures of shaving the mustaches brought back those horrible images right before the Holocaust of I am, and it’s, it’s really a problem. I don’t think my own advice is for Israel not to rush into any peace treaties where they’re going to have to give up something tangible, land and defensible borders. I think that the lesson of Oslo, the lesson of the [inaudible] and of October 7th is that Israel needs defensible borders and a buffer zone between themselves and their neighbors.

I want to ask everybody who possibly can to donate to Alma. I think Alma is a wonderful organization. I know that there have not been that many trips to Israel and to Israel’s north over the course of the war. I know there have been some congressional delegations, but please go to https://israel.alma.org/donate or just go to israelalma.org and you’ll find it on her website. Alma does wonderful work and I think it’s very important that we continue to have a voice such as Lieutenant Colonel Sarit Zahavi, who really does understand and appreciate everything that’s going on in Israel’s north and what’s going on just north of Israel’s borders.

Also we had a met also very much rely on your funding. We go to Capitol Hill practically every day and meet with members of Congress and try the best we can to keep up with what’s going on in the Middle East and members of Congress and their staffers have grown to rely on us and depend on us for reports that they know they can trust, so if you can also please support us at www.ahmetonline.org. Thank you so much, Sarit. I really rely on your wisdom and your updates. You’re an absolute gem, and let’s hope that you will continue to prosper and flourish and spread your knowledge.

Sarit: Thank you very much. Actually, I wish that one day we’ll come and we will not need a center and we won’t have security challenges here.

Interviewer: Wonderful. Insha’Allah, as they say. Thank you so much.

Sarit: Thank you.

Interviewer: Thank you. Bye.

[END]