Chapter 1238 Golan Heights
May!
Troubled times!
When Lebanon and Syria had just wiped out the rebels, Israel sent troops to attack the Golan Heights.
It attracted global attention all of a sudden.
The world was discussing whether the seventh Middle East war would break out.
Middle Eastern countries and Arab countries have accused Israel of launching a war without authorization.
However, Israel claimed that the sovereignty of the Golan Heights belonged to Israel. The Israeli representative took out a copy of the Jewish Bible and stated with certainty that the Golan Heights belonged to Israel more than 2,000 years ago.
The Golan Heights is 71 kilometers long from north to south, about 43 kilometers wide in the middle, and covers an area of 1,800 kilometers. It is located in the southwest of Syria and on the east side of the Jordan Valley. It extends to the Lukad River in the east, the Yarmouk River in the south, and the eastern slope of Mount Hermon in the north. It is adjacent to Lake Tiberias in the upper reaches of the Jordan River in the southwest. It has abundant water resources and the highest point is Mount Hermon at an altitude of 2,814 meters.
The southern part of the Golan Heights is an agricultural area, and the foothills of the Sheikh Mountain in the north are pastures covered with trees and bushes.
The Golan Heights borders Israel to the west and is a strategic location on the southwestern border of Syria. From the Golan Heights, you can overlook the Galilee Valley in Israel.
This is an absolute strategic location for both Israel and Syria.
Syria and other countries occupy the Golan Heights and can easily fire artillery and missiles throughout Israel.
If Israel controls the Golan Heights, it will control the vital water source, and it is only 60 kilometers from the Golan Heights to the Syrian capital Damascus.
Since losing the Golan Heights in the fifth Middle East war, Israel has always wanted to take back the Golan Heights and gain strategic initiative.
Only a few attempts, whether open or covert, ended in failure.
This time, Israel instigated internal rebellions in Lebanon and Syria, and dispatched troops to take advantage of the chaos and seize the Golan Heights in one fell swoop.
But before Israel was fully prepared, the armed rebellion in Lebanon and Syria was wiped out.
But Israel has not given up the plan to attack the Golan Heights, because Iraq has hundreds of thousands of coalition forces.
If the coalition forces can be dragged into the water, then not to mention Lebanon, Syria, and Palestine, the entire Middle East can be pushed flat.
Although the United States has warned Israel, Israel simply does not listen.
Israel is determined to take the United States. At critical moments, the United States will definitely stand on Israel's side. It may not necessarily use force against Syria and Lebanon, but as long as it does something to prevent Lebanon and Syria from transferring border troops, it will be enough.
Israel must have the Golan Heights, in addition to its extremely important strategic position, because the Golan Heights has abundant water resources and oil and natural gas resources.
Water resources are a very valuable strategic resource for Israel, which has a Mediterranean climate with dry and hot summers. At the beginning, Israel's agriculture developed very well. The most important thing is that Israel controls the Golan Heights and has a large amount of water resources for agricultural irrigation.
Since the loss of the Golan Heights, Israel has to pay a considerable amount of water purchase fees every year to obtain the water resources of the Golan Heights.
Since the two sides became enemies, Israel cannot even buy water with money, because people don't sell it at all.
This has caused a large-scale reduction in the production of grain, fruits and vegetables in Israel. Not to mention exporting like before, it is even impossible to be self-sufficient and has to import grain, fruits and vegetables from outside.
In addition, the Golan Heights is rich in oil and natural gas.
The Golan Heights has proven oil reserves of 1 billion barrels and natural gas reserves of more than 300 billion cubic meters.
After the establishment of the independent state of Palestine and the loss of the Golan Heights, Israel's oil and natural gas were all imported. Before that, it was imported from Lebanon, Syria, Palestine and Jordan, and the price was relatively cheap.
However, since the two sides fell out, Israel can no longer import oil and natural gas from neighboring countries. Israel has to import oil and natural gas from Africa and Russia, and the price is much higher than before.
Even if the United States takes over Iraq now, Israel will not be able to use Iraq's oil and natural gas in the short term, because Iraq will need a certain amount of time to re-produce oil and natural gas after the war reconstruction.
In addition, if you want to lay oil pipelines and natural gas pipelines from Iraq to Israel, you have to go through Syria or Jordan.
This is simply impossible under normal circumstances now.
In order to seize the Golan Heights, Israel dispatched 14 brigades, including 4 brigades to attack the northern part of the Golan Heights, 3 brigades to attack the southern part of the Golan Heights, 4 brigades to attack the central part of the Golan Heights, and two brigades as mobile forces.
Syria has 25,000 people stationed in the Golan Heights all year round and has built a defense line. The entire defense line consists of 16 positions, each of which is connected by a road and a 4-meter-deep and 4-6-meter-wide anti-tank trench for protection. There are also 189 bunkers built along the entire defense line, each of which can withstand a direct hit from a 1,000-pound bomb.
A single position will deploy an armored battalion or company, cooperate with several infantry units for defense, and have 4 self-propelled howitzers, mortars, etc. as supporting firepower points.
It can be said that Syria has built many strong positions in the Golan Heights to guard against Israel.
Even if there was an internal rebellion this time, Syria did not mobilize the garrison of the Golan Heights to participate in the suppression of the rebellion.
Not only did they not mobilize troops to participate in the suppression of the rebellion, but they dispatched troops to strengthen the Golan Heights defense line.
Not only that, Lebanon and Jordan also strengthened their defense lines in the Golan Heights area to guard against Israel.
As a result, Israel really launched a war with the intention of capturing the Golan Heights.
As the saying goes, the person who knows you best is your enemy!
This is absolutely true!
Israel's large-scale military mobilization cannot be concealed from the reconnaissance of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Palestine.
Israel's land area is too small, and every move is under its nose, which is difficult to hide.
The war between Palestine and Israel does not require missiles or cannons with a range of more than 25 kilometers. Only rockets, mortars, and howitzers are needed to cover the entire territory of Israel.
In this case, all parties knew about Israel's military mobilization early and issued warnings.
When Israel took action, all parties also mobilized their troops, stockpiled weapons, ammunition and supplies, and formulated combat plans.
And they occupied the moral high ground of justice in public opinion early and condemned Israel.
When Israel launched the war, Syria and other parties were not caught off guard.
Especially Syria, which faced the Israeli attack head-on. Israel did not attack Lebanon and Jordan. Under this circumstance, Lebanon and Jordan would not declare war on Israel for a while, because everyone had to consider the Americans.
With hundreds of thousands of coalition forces in Iraq, it is impossible to say that everyone is not under pressure. (End of this chapter)