Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, recently announced that Syria's Golan Heights would "forever" remain under Israeli control.
Israel claims to have annexed the Golan Heights back in 1981, after occupying the area in 1967. However, this claim has never been internationally recognized. The United Nations has repeatedly said that the territory is Syrian and that Israel can not annex it. The international community, including even Israel's top ally the United States, has remained firm that Israel must eventually return the Golan to Syria, rejecting the legitimacy of Israeli settlements and population transfers into the area.
Despite the UN peacekeeping force deployed in the Golan, UNDOF, which monitors a ceasefire line that has separated Israelis from Syrians in the Golan Heights since the 1973 Yom Kippur War, it seems that Netanyahu just won't give up.
As with almost all areas in the region, Golan Heights comes with a long history, despite Israeli attempts to rebrand it as an integral part of the Jewish state.
Here are 8 things you should know about the area:
1. Israel's annexation of the Golan Heights has been declared illegitimate by the international community
The United Nations is not alone in this. The U.S. says that anyone born in the Golan shall have their place of birth listed as Syria . The European Union does not recognize Israeli claims on the Golan. Germany doesn't .
2. Israel captured the majority of Golan Heights during the Six-Day War
Israel currently occupies more than 1,000 square kilometers of the Golan, while around 300 square kilometers remains under Syrian control.
3. The Golan Heights borders Palestine, Lebanon, and Jordan
The Golan Heights is a large plateau that sits at the southern foot of Mount Hermon. With an average altitude of 1,000 meters above sea level, the area overlooks southern Syria, Jordan and Palestine, while it's separated from Lebanon by the beginning of the Anti-Lebanon mountain range and Mount Hermon.
4. A large Syrian Druze community historically lived in the Golan Heights, but following the wars with Israel in 1967 and 1973, most fled to other parts of Syria
During the Six Day War, 130,000 Syrian Druze were expelled from their lands when Israel seized the area from Syria. In 2012, about 22,000 Druze with Syrian citizenship were living in the Golan Heights.
5. In 1981, more than 90% of people living in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights refused Israeli citizenship
6. The area features numerous archeological sites, mountains, streams and waterfalls, including the Banyas waterfall
7. In 1972, a professor noticed that the conditions in the Golan are very suitable for the cultivation of wine grapes. The first vines were planted in 1976
8. To the northeast lies Lake Ram, whose only sources are rain water and an underground spring
