Residents of Jdeidet Artouz al-Balad, in the western Damascus countryside (southwestern Syria), held a protest on Friday, October 30, condemning Israeli violations and practices in southern Syria and rejecting continued attacks against Syrians.

Participants in the protest, which Enab Baladi covered, expressed solidarity with residents of frontline villages in Quneitra (southwestern Syria) and Daraa (southern Syria). They rejected Israeli incursions and territorial ambitions and affirmed Syria’s sovereignty.

The protesters also demanded information about the fate of those abducted and detained in Israeli prisons, and called for their release.

Israel Accused of Stealing Water From Daraa and Quneitra

Speaking at the protest, Sheikh Ayman Skeiker, a resident of Jdeidet al-Balad, expressed the town’s support for villages in Quneitra, the Golan Heights and Daraa. He said these communities faced different conditions, with Israeli violations escalating and taking various forms targeting both people and land.

“The Israeli occupation is stealing water from the lands of Daraa and Quneitra, water that Syrians have a natural right to. These violations, which terrorize children, women and older people, all share one objective: destroying our cause and our national identity,” he said.

Skeiker called on the United Nations and the international community to pressure Israel to halt its violations and release the detainees.

There are currently 39 Syrian detainees in Israeli prisons, including six who were minors when they were detained, according to Enab Baladi’s correspondent in Quneitra.

Rights Group Documents “Arbitrary Detention”

In a report published last May, Enab Baladi highlighted arrests carried out by Israeli forces in southern Syria. These have become one of the means of putting pressure on local residents, alongside incursions, searches, checkpoints, land bulldozing and house demolitions.

According to documented testimonies, Israeli incursions and searches also leave residents terrified that young men will be detained. Such detention amounts to enforced disappearance when there is no information about where Israel has taken the detainee and no opportunity to contact them.

Fadel Abdul Ghany, director of the Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR), said Israel’s detention of Syrians falls under the international humanitarian law governing military occupation, particularly the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 and its provisions concerning the protection of protected persons, especially Articles 27 and 42.

He added that, since December 2024, SNHR had documented cases of residents of southern Syria being arbitrarily detained and forcibly transferred to Israel. He said this constituted a clear violation of Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits forcible transfers from occupied territory.

He noted that the UN Human Rights Council had repeatedly called for the release of Syrian detainees in Israeli prisons, including those held for more than 30 years.

Torture in Israeli Prisons and Efforts to Take Legal Action

On October 26, the US magazine New Lines, which covers human rights, also published a report highlighting the continuing suffering of families of Syrian detainees forcibly abducted by Israeli forces from Quneitra and Daraa in southern Syria and taken to detention facilities inside Israel.

The testimonies describe several incidents, including the abduction of Saddam Hassan Ahmed, then 16, from his father’s field in Jubata al-Khashab in April 2024, before the fall of the Syrian regime, despite his possession of a UN permit. They also describe the abduction of 16-year-old twins Mahmoud and Mohammed Mreywad after an Israeli soldier threatened to detain their younger brother and grandfather unless the twins came forward.

The report also addressed other Syrian detainees, including Ali Hmade from Jabah village in Quneitra governorate. He was detained after Israeli forces surrounded his family’s home at 4 a.m. and called on him over loudspeakers to come outside. Nael Mishaal, from Al-Samdaniyah village, was detained in his village at the same time as his relative by marriage, Hmade.

Among the cases is that of Hameed, a pseudonym, from Quneitra. He was released after spending a year and four months in the Israeli detention facilities of Sde Teiman, Ofer and Megiddo under administrative detention without charge.

The report also examined the circumstances surrounding the killing of Muath al-Baair, from Jamlah village in Daraa governorate, who had Down syndrome and hearing difficulties. He was walking through his town during an Israeli incursion, as Israeli forces set up a military checkpoint, when he was detained and then shot dead. His body was later handed over to the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF).

The report documents torture and other practices inflicted on Syrian detainees in Israel’s Sde Teiman and Megiddo prisons, alongside efforts by their families to pursue legal avenues to reach their detained relatives and secure their release.

“We are currently unable to bring cases before the International Criminal Court because neither Syria nor Israel is a party to the Rome Statute. Referring the case from the Security Council to the ICC also faces the obstacle of the US veto in support of Israel,” said Ahmed Mousa, a German-Syrian lawyer originally from the occupied Golan Heights.

Palestinian lawyer Khaled Mahajna, who represents detainee Saddam Ahmed, said: “I used to follow the news and see the Israeli incursions, but I never imagined there were Syrian detainees.”

He noted that Saddam had not been formally charged, making it extremely difficult to defend him or obtain an order for his release.