Golan Heights
an area captured by Israel from Syria in the Six Day War of 1967. In 1981, the Israeli parliament extended Israeli law to the area, where twenty thousand Israelis now live across thirty settlements. There are also twenty thousand Syrian Druze living in the Golan Heights. Although Israel returned small parts of the Golan to Syria in 1974, Israeli leaders are reluctant to withdraw from the territory, given the strategic advantage it provides to any army that holds it. From the Golan Heights, the Israeli military can look down on the plain that leads to the Syrian capital, Damascus, a mere forty
miles away. The Israeli military also maintains a sophisticated listening and radar station there.