Good fences make good neighbours

When fences erode, or nobody is at home, neighbours tend to take advantage.

- NAVTEJ SARNA

A nibble at a patch of land, a fence post pushed a yard away, a wall extended, a fact created on the ground.

After the dramatic collapse of the Assad regime, something similar is happening in the Golan Heights, militarily wrested from Syria by Israel in 1967. Part of the area was vacated by Israel after the 1973 Yom Kippur war and a Separation Zone created between the Syrian and Israeli held territories under the 1974 Disengagement Agreement. The arrangement was monitored by the UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) along with the UN Truce Supervision Organisation (UNTSO). India contributed significantly to this operation, even suffering two fatal casualties. The agreement worked remarkably well for 50 years, to the extent that Israel preferred the known devil of the father-son Assad regime to the unpredictable progeny of the Arab Spring.