We must apply sovereignty wherever possible. Yes, also in the Quneitra area and the Crown of Hermon region (some call it the Syrian Golan). International law stands with us on this issue. Prof. Talia Einhorn
The application of Israeli sovereignty in the territories of the Land of Israel reflects our understanding that this is our land, and that is why we must pursue this objective wherever feasible, such as in the Jordan Valley, Area C in Judea and Samaria, and the Mt. Hermon Crown and Quneitra area. Even if political constraints force us to postpone the application of sovereignty over all these territories, this should be our ultimate goal. Let us not be impatient.
International law supports our position in this regard. The principle of uti possidetis dictates that the borders of a new state are determined by its existing borders at the time of its establishment. When the State of Israel was established, these were the borders delineated for the reconstitution of the Jewish national home in the Land of Israel, as outlined in the Mandate and affirmed in Article 80 of the UN Charter. No subsequent events have altered this determination.
This principle has underpinned the border agreements in the peace treaties between Israel and Egypt in 1979, between Israel and Jordan in 1994, and also informed the delineation of the blue line (the withdrawal line) between Israel and Lebanon, which the UN recognized in 2000 as the de facto border, despite the absence of an official border line, since ultimately no peace agreement was signed between the countries. The territories of Judea and Samaria and the Gaza Strip fall within these borders. Consequently, the application of sovereignty over these areas requires no more than a government directive to apply Israeli law, jurisdiction, and administration to them.
The status of the Golan Heights, captured in the Six-Day War, was different. Initially, most of the Golan and the Hauran were designated to be part of the British mandate, as per agreements signed between Britain and France in December 1920. These agreements acknowledged that Jews had purchased numerous land tracts for full payment, had them registered in their names in the Ottoman land registration books, and received title deeds confirming this. While the settlement points established there were abandoned already in the early 20th century, Jewish ownership – primarily of PICA, the Palestine Jewish Colonization Association, established by Baron James de Rothschild – remained in force. However, Britain transferred these areas to the French mandate in the British-French agreement that definitively delineated the border in 1923 (the Newcombe-Paulet Agreement). The registration of the land in the names of their Jewish owners remained unchanged even after Syria was established. Only in the 1940s did Syria expropriate the lands without compensating the owners as required by international law.
In the Yom Kippur War, Israel captured additional territories in the northern Golan and Mt. Hermon. However, following the disengagement agreement reached in May 1974, Israel withdrew from the town of Quneitra and its immediate environs, as well as from the Hermon Crown, the highest peak. Because the Golan was not included in the British mandate territory according to the Newcombe-Paulet Agreement, a simple government order was not sufficient to apply Israeli sovereignty to it. Consequently, Israel enacted the Golan Heights Law in 1981, which stipulated that “the laws, jurisdiction, and administration of the State shall apply in the territory of the Golan Heights.” This legislation effectively concluded fourteen years of military rule in the Golan.
On March 25, 2019, U.S. President Donald Trump signed a presidential order declaring the United States’ recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, following his statement that “After 52 years it is time for the United States to fully recognize Israel’s Sovereignty over the Golan Heights, which is of critical strategic and security importance to the State of Israel and regional stability!”
The Biden administration did not change this order. In July 2024, following a Hezbollah bombing of Majdal Shams that killed 12 children, the United States reiterated its full recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights.
Israel would do well to assert its sovereignty over the territories it vacated after the Yom Kippur War and has since recaptured. This stance is further supported by the presence of an Israeli and Druze population that favor Israeli sovereignty, alongside the absence of a hostile population in the Golan Heights – who fled from Golan into Syria in 1967. It is further supported by the significant amount of land that was under Jewish ownership and was expropriated by Syrian authorities without compensation to owners, which contravenes international law. The American recognition by President Trump’s administration and subsequently by President Biden’s administration gives us significant hope that, as the song says, “For us, for us, we will have the Crown of the Hermon.”