Thirteen Israeli citizens were arrested after breaching the border and crossing into Syrian territory at two separate locations in the Golan Heights and Mount Hermon on Thursday, the Israel Defense Forces said.

The move was coordinated and planned by a group calling itself the “Bashan Pioneers,” using the biblical name for the Golan Heights. It advocates for setting up Israeli settlements in the Israeli-held buffer zone inside Syrian territory and carried out a similar operation last August.

The IDF stated, “Troops were dispatched to the two locations and shortly afterward, the civilians were located. After some of them confronted the forces, they were safely returned to Israeli territory under IDF escort. The suspects were transferred for further processing to the Israel Police.”

“The IDF strongly condemns this incident and emphasizes its severity, which constitutes a criminal offense that endangers civilians and IDF troops.”

According to Army Radio, one group crossed the border after opening a military gate in the border fence, and driving a vehicle decorated with Israeli flags while shouting, “May we get to settle [here]!”

Five people reportedly crossed the border in the area of Mount Hermon, and eight others near the Syrian village Bir al-Ajam, across the border from the Israeli town Alonei Habashan in the central Golan Heights.

One group was seen driving around inside Bir al-Ajam before being caught and returned to Israel.

The incident raises concerns over border security along the sensitive buffer zone, following August’s incident, as well as the mass breach of the border by hundreds of Israeli Druze in an effort to protect their brethren in Syria last July.

Doron Kadosh, Army Radio’s military correspondent, commented, “It is unclear how the IDF failed to prevent the cutting of the border fence with a power saw, and even more unclear how this happened only four months after a similar incident, when the IDF promised to investigate and draw conclusions.”

“The IDF should not be condemning such events. The IDF should be preventing and stopping them before they happen. A situation in which a border is cut with a power saw and people drive a car into Syrian territory to wander around should never have been possible in the first place.”

“Today it is Israeli civilians who want to settle in Syria — tomorrow it could be others on the opposite side of the border,” Kadosh warned.

The incident took place just hours before six Israeli troops were wounded in a firefight during a cross-border raid in the village of Beit Jinn in southern Syria, highlighting the tense situation on Israel’s northern border.

This article was originally published by All Israel News. 

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