Syrians Describe Abuse and Disappearances After Buffer Zone Seizure

Syrians detained by Israeli forces in areas near the occupied Golan Heights have described beatings, solitary confinement and prolonged imprisonment without charges. Families of other detainees say they have received no information about their relatives’ whereabouts.

Ali al-Abdullah spent more than five months in Israeli detention after soldiers detained him in southwestern Syria last year. He said guards beat him and held him in solitary confinement, but authorities never brought charges against him.

Kinan Baker was taken from his home during a night raid in a nearby Syrian village. His family says it has not heard from him since and does not know where he is being held or why.

The two men are among dozens of Syrians detained by Israel since its forces seized a United Nations-mandated buffer zone following the ouster of Bashar Assad in December 2024. Human rights groups, former detainees and relatives have reported physical and verbal abuse during arrests and inside Israeli detention facilities.

Israel’s takeover of the buffer zone triggered anger across Syria, particularly among families living inside or near the 235-square-kilometre area. Residents who had celebrated Assad’s removal soon faced Israeli checkpoints, military patrols and a series of detentions in their villages.

Families say their appeals to the Syrian government and the United Nations for information have produced little response.

“We can only hold on to hope in God, and pray that he reunites us with our son,” said Huda Baker, Kinan’s mother.

The Israeli military says its presence in and around the buffer zone is necessary to protect its northern border from Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Lebanese armed group that fought alongside Assad’s forces during Syria’s 13-year civil war.

The military said its troops question and detain individuals when they have reasonable suspicion of involvement in terrorist activity. It rejected allegations of detainee abuse and declined to comment on individual cases, saying detainees and their families had not provided their Syrian government identification numbers.

Israel captured the Golan Heights from Syria during the 1967 Middle East war and later annexed the territory. Most of the international community does not recognise the annexation.

A 1974 agreement established a UN-patrolled buffer zone in southern Syria to prevent further conflict. Israel seized the area in December 2024 and declared the agreement void.

Since then, Israeli forces have established military outposts and carried out airstrikes, raids and incursions in Quneitra and Daraa provinces. Their operations have also extended into countryside southwest of Damascus.

Israel remains sceptical of Syria’s new leader, Ahmad al-Sharaa, who previously led a militant group once linked to al-Qaeda. Although al-Sharaa has sought to build closer ties with the United States and European countries, Israel remains wary of his leadership.

Al-Sharaa has called on Israel to withdraw from the buffer zone. Mohammed Saeed, a spokesperson for Quneitra province, rejected Israeli claims that militant groups operate in the area, describing them as “baseless lies”.

He said Assad’s removal had ended the presence of foreign forces, including Iranian and Hezbollah personnel, in the region.

Syrian government officials and UN-backed investigators say Israeli forces have detained 49 Syrians since December 2024. Sixteen have been released over the past year.

The Syria Justice and Accountability Center, a Washington-based human rights organisation, said former detainees and relatives who witnessed arrests had reported ill-treatment and torture.

Salma Daoudi, a researcher at the organisation, said former detainees had described being held in stress positions and threatened at gunpoint during interviews with the group.

Al-Abdullah, 20, said Israeli soldiers detained him in June 2025 at a checkpoint in Ain Thakar, a village overlooking the buffer zone. Soldiers questioned him about possible links to armed Islamist groups. He denied any affiliation and said no such groups operated in his village.

He said soldiers handcuffed him and transferred him between several Israeli detention centres over the next five months.

During periods of solitary confinement in two prisons, he said, there was no ventilation and the lights remained on. Guards removed his handcuffs for only a few minutes each day so he could eat.

“Sleeping was not allowed. You had to remain seated cross-legged the whole time and were not allowed to lie down. You would spend seven days like that,” he said.

Huda Baker said Israeli soldiers raided her family home in August 2025 while she was asleep. They threatened to blow up the house unless her 39-year-old son Kinan surrendered within five minutes.

She said Kinan walked outside, where soldiers blindfolded and handcuffed him. The family has received no information about him since.

Another former detainee, Wadih Baker, who is not related to Kinan, said Israeli soldiers detained him while he was walking in Tranje village in June 2025. He said troops initially told him he would be released within five minutes.

Instead, he remained in detention for about 15 months. He said soldiers first held him at a military post near the Syrian border before transferring him to a prison the following day.

Both Wadih Baker and al-Abdullah said they had been held at Ofer Prison near Ramallah in the occupied West Bank and later at Sde Teiman Prison in Israel’s Negev Desert.

Israeli and international human rights organisations have previously reported allegations of torture and ill-treatment of Palestinian prisoners at both facilities.

The detentions have also affected families whose relatives disappeared before Assad’s removal. Saddam Saad Eldin was 16 when Israeli troops detained him in April 2024 while he worked in an olive grove inside the UN buffer zone.

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His father, 47-year-old Hassan Saad Eldin, said he had received no information about his son’s whereabouts. He also said Israeli forces had prevented him from accessing farmland in Jabata al-Khashab village.

The father said Israeli forces bulldozed between 10 and 12 dunums of olive groves and completely demolished a livestock stable. A large dirt roadblock now prevents him from reaching his land, he added.

Hassan said he could not understand claims that his village might host armed groups, whether backed by Iran or otherwise.

“We are civilians — farmers and agricultural workers — with no external allegiances,” he said.

He regularly speaks to former detainees after their release, hoping to learn something about his son. One former prisoner who said he had seen Saddam told him the teenager had not been harmed.

But Hassan remains worried as other former detainees continue to describe abuse inside Israeli prisons.