Israeli army conducts drill in occupied Golan Heights

The Israeli army said on Thursday it conducted a military exercise along the border with Syria and in parts of the occupied Golan Heights.

In a statement, the army said the 210th Division “completed the exercise with the participation of forces from neighboring sectors and the Home Front Command, in cooperation with local authorities and emergency and rescue agencies.”

The army said the forces trained for “dozens of scenarios,” noting that the exercises also “incorporated lessons learned from various combat fronts” and from the events of Oct. 7, 2023.

On that date, Palestinian resistance group Hamas and other Palestinian factions launched a large-scale retaliatory attack from the Gaza Strip in southern Israel.

Israel has occupied most of the Syrian Golan Heights since 1967. After the fall of Bashar Assad’s regime in late 2024, Israel declared the 1974 disengagement agreement collapsed and occupied the Syrian buffer zone and other sites, including the Syrian side of Mount Hermon (Jabal al-Sheikh).

Israel also occupies Palestinian and Lebanese territories and refuses to withdraw from them or allow the establishment of an independent Palestinian state in line with relevant UN resolutions.