Khader

Members of the Druze community watch the fighting in Syria's civil war, next to the border fence between Syria and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, near the Druze village of Majdal Shams, June 16, 2015.

Druze in the Golan Heights have long been ‘on the fence’ between Syria and Israel. Syria’s civil war has changed things.

Conflict

As ethnic Druze in Syria are caught in a flashpoint on the edge of the country’s six-year civil war, their neighbors and relatives across the border in the Israel-occupied Golan Heights are figuring out their allegiances. Some Golan Druze are reaffirming their historical and in many cases, familial ties to Syria, while others are drawing closer to an Israel that after years of caution may begin to intervene in the Syrian conflict at its door.