'Get out war criminal!': Netanyahu confronted by angry Majdal Shams crowd in visit to deadly strike site

Residents of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights town of Majdal Shams on Monday heckled and chased away Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was visiting the Druze town following the deadly strike that killed 12 children.

Locals could be heard chanting "Killer! Killer!", "Get out, war criminal" and "You’re not welcome here!" as the premier, accompanied by the head of Israeli intelligence service Shin Bet, arrived at the site of Saturday’s massacre.

"Oh you Zionist, get out of the free Arab land", others said.

Majdal Shams’ residents also held signs with "War criminal" and "Down with the killing of children" as Netanyahu made his appearance.

Netanyahu was not the only official to feel the anger of Majdal Shams’ residents. Extremist Finance Minister, Bezalel Smotrich, was heckled and kicked out by mourners as he attempted to attend funeral services.

 "You murderer, get out of here!", "He shouldn’t have come here at all" "He came to dance on our children’s blood", people could be heard yelling.

Netanyahu, who did not acknowledge the demonstrators, vowed Israel would deliver a "severe response" to the rocket fire that killed 12 children.

"These children are our children ... The State of Israel will not, and cannot, let this pass. Our response will come and it will be severe," Netanyahu said at the site of the attack, according to a statement issued by his office.

Majdal Shams has been thrust into the spotlight following the deadly strike that killed 12 boys and girls aged between 10 and 16, after a rocket hit a field as the youngsters played football.

Israel has placed the blame on Hezbollah, though the Lebanese group has denied any involvement and has pointed the finger at Israel.

The attack on Majdal Shams has sparked fears of further exchanges of fire between Hezbollah and Israel, triggering an even bigger escalation in the already volatile region.

The two have been engaging in near-daily cross-border fire one day after Israel’s deadly military offensive in the Gaza Strip broke out, on 7 October.

Meanwhile, the Syrian regime's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it held Israel responsible for the attack. In a statement on Sunday, the ministry said: "As part of its attempts to escalate the situation in our region and expand the circle of its aggression against it, the Israeli occupation entity committed a heinous crime yesterday in the city of Majdal Shams in the Syrian Golan Heights, occupied since 1967, and then blamed the Lebanese National Resistance for its crime.”

"Our people in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights, who have refused over decades of Israeli occupation to give up their Syrian Arab identity, will not be fooled by the occupation's lies and false accusations against the Lebanese national resistance," the ministry added.

At least 24 people from the Israel-annexed territory have been killed since, with over 100 Lebanese civilians killed, alongside more than 300 Hezbollah fighters.

In Israel, 10 civilians, a foreign agricultural worker and 20 soldiers have been killed.

Thousands of mourners gathered in the majority Druze town to lay the youngsters to rest on Sunday and Monday.

Men, dressed in black and wearing white caps topped with red carried the coffins covered in white, young boys symbolically carried footballs over their heads and women wept as they embraced children.

"Enough is enough. We hope the war will end. Enough of this tragedy and bloodshed," one woman told AFP.

Who are the Golan Height's Druze population?

The Druze population in the occupied Golan Heights largely identifies as Syrian, with most refusing to accept Israeli nationality after the country seized two-thirds of the territory from Syria in 1967 in the backdrop of the Arab-Israeli war in the same year. The territory was then formally annexed in 1981, in a move not recognised by the international community, with the exception of the United States under then President Donald Trump since 2019.

The town’s population however, have residential status in Israel.

A considerable amount of Golan Heights' Druze population has acquired Israeli citizenship since 2011, due to fears over the Syrian Civil War.

Despite their status, Golan Heights residents have been subject to discriminatory policies such as land and water allocation, due to the increase of Israeli settlements hindering access to water sources. Some 25,000 Jewish Israelis live in the occupied Golan Heights today, across 30 settlements. 

Additionally, the 2018 Jewish Nation-State Basic Law brought forth by parliament, which officially established Israel as the "historic home of the Jewish people" with a "united Jerusalem" as its capital, also triggered fears of further discrimination among the Druze.

The law also states "the right to exercise national self-determination" in Israel is unique to the Jewish people, and established Hebrew as Israel's sole official language, relegating Arabic to a "special status".

The hilly territory, which shares a border Jordan and Lebanon, is considered an occupied area under international law and UN Security Council resolutions. Syria has repeatedly made demands for its return.