The Foreign and Expatriate Ministry affirmed that Syria categorically rejects the announcement by the Israeli occupation on holding elections of the so-called “local councils” on October 2018 in the villages of the occupied Syrian Golan, stressing that the Golan is an integral part of the Syrian territory and that it will return to the motherland sooner or later.

In letters to the UN Secretary General and the Head of the Security Council, the Ministry said that the Israeli entity has recently issued new resolutions related to holding elections of the so-called local councils in the villages of the occupied Syrian Golan according to Israeli law.

The Ministry pointed out that these Israeli actions come as no surprise because Israel has been investing in the crisis in Syria through its support to the armed terrorist groups which was clear since the beginning of the events in Syria.

The letters noted that the Syrian Arab citizens of the occupied Golan have rejected in the national document which they had issued on 25/3/1981 any decision issued by the Israeli entity to annex the Golan as well as their rejection of all Israeli decisions aimed at depriving them of their Syrian Arab identity.

The Ministry indicated that the fifth paragraph of the aforementioned document provided that they do not recognize any group of the so-called local councils and that the heads and the members of these councils do not represent them, and that they made an irrevocable decision to reject the imposition of the Israeli identity on them, adding that after they learned the new Israeli decision, the people of the Golan renewed their vehement rejection of these Israeli measures.

The letters went on to say that Israel, which refused to comply with International legitimacy over the past years and rebelled against its decisions to end the occupation of the Syrian Arab Golan, has repeated this rebellion by issuing this new decision.

The Ministry pointed out that the Security Council affirmed in its resolution no. 497 that the Israeli decision to impose its law, authority, and administration in the occupied Syrian Golan is null , void, and without international legal power, adding that the Security Council demanded that Israel annul its decision immediately and declared that all provisions of the Geneva Convention on the Protection of Civilian Persons in the Time of War are still in effect in the Syrian territory occupied by Israel since June 1967.

The letters asserted that the new Israeli decisions constitute another flagrant violation of the UN Charter, international humanitarian law, and the Geneva Convention.

The Ministry went on to say that Syria calls upon the UN Secretary General and the Security Council to condemn these new provocative Israeli measures that blatantly violate the Security Council resolution 497, demanding that the Council force Israel to release Syrian and Palestinian captives from Israeli jails, including Sedqi al-Maqet, who has spent more than 30 years in Israeli jails.

The Ministry concluded by saying that Syria categorically rejects the new Israeli decision and that it reiterates that the Golan is an integral part of Syrian territory and will return to the homeland sooner or later, stressing its commitment to standing by its people in the occupied Golan who reject the annexation and this new decision.