Sheikh Mohammed also promises to support the new administration and the rehabilitation of Syria’s infrastructure.
Qatar’s prime minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani, has demanded that Israel “immediately withdraw” its forces from the United Nations-established buffer zone with Syria after Israeli troops entered the area following the removal of Syria’s longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad.
Speaking on Thursday at a news conference in Damascus alongside de facto Syrian ruler Ahmed al-Sharaa, Sheikh Mohammed criticised Israeli moves to occupy the territory near the Golan Heights in southern Syria.
“The Israeli occupation’s seizure of the buffer zone is a reckless … act, and it must immediately withdraw,” Sheikh Mohammed said.
Israel deployed military units last month to the buffer zone, which lies along the Golan Heights and separates Syria and Israel, after al-Assad was toppled by opposition fighters led by al-Sharaa’s Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group. The area has been an officially designated demilitarised zone as part of a 1974 UN-brokered ceasefire.
As its troops encroached on the area, Israel also launched hundreds of air strikes across Syria. It said its air attacks were part of a campaign to stop weapons from landing in the hands of “extremists”, a term it has applied to several groups in Syria, including HTS.
Al-Sharaa said at the news conference that his country is ready to welcome UN forces into the buffer zone.
“Israel’s advance in the region was due to the presence of Iranian militias and Hezbollah. After the liberation of Damascus, I believe that they have no presence at all. There are pretexts that Israel is using today to advance into the Syrian regions, into the buffer zone,” he said.
“Qatar no doubt has a big role to play. … They will play an active role in continuing to exercise pressure [on Israel to withdraw] together with Western and European nations and the United States of America,” he told reporters in Damascus.
Sheikh Mohammed also promised to support the new administration and the rehabilitation of Syria’s infrastructure, devastated by nearly 14 years of war.
“We will provide the necessary technical support to make the infrastructure operational again and provide support to the electricity sector,” he said, adding that Qatar “extends its hand to our Syrian brothers for future partnerships”.
He also called for sanctions on Syria to be lifted and highlighted that “sanctions will have a negative impact on the support provided to Syria and the Syrian people.”
The US and European Union both imposed sanctions on al-Assad and his government for allegedly committing crimes during the war, which began after security forces cracked down on pro-democracy protesters in 2011.
This month, the US Department of the Treasury issued a general licence lasting six months that authorises certain transactions with the Syrian government, including some energy sales and incidental transactions.
The action does not remove any sanctions but will ensure they “do not impede activities to meet basic human needs, including the provision of public services or humanitarian assistance”, the Treasury Department said.
The EU has agreed to meet at the end of January to discuss lifting sanctions on Syria.
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