Austria’s decision [June 6] to evacuate its 380 UNDOF (United Nations Disengagement Observer Force) troops from the Golan Heights landed in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s hands like a ripe fruit. He opened Sunday’s [June 9 cabinet meeting by telling his ministers: “The withdrawal of the Austrian forces underscores the fact that Israel cannot depend on international forces for its security.” Netanyahu was absolutely correct. There is no country anywhere that can depend on international forces to ensure its security for years, not least in a region that the entire international community, without exception, regards as being occupied territory. Not even Israel can do that.
The UNDOF force was established as part of the Disengagement Agreement (1974) in which Israel withdrew from all the new territories it conquered in the Yom Kippur War and an additional 60 square kilometers in the Golan Heights that it had controlled since the Six-Day War in 1967. A UN buffer zone was created in the evacuated area, and the number of Israeli and Syria troops deployed on both sides of the border was reduced.
