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These "Peacekeepers" are sitting ducks. Often with orders not to even load their weapons with ammo.
I'm amazed this hasn't happened sooner.
What will the UN do about it? Probably nothing.
Read the story @
U.N. Says 43 Peacekeepers Detained by Armed Group in Syria 81 Others Trapped TheBlaze.com
Clashes erupted between al-Qaida-linked Syrian rebels and U.N. peacekeepers in the Golan Heights on Saturday after the militants surrounded their encampment, activists and officials said, as the international organization risked being sucked further into the conflict. Other U.N. peacekeepers were able to flee from a different encampment that that was also surrounded by rebels of the Nusra Front, al-Qaida's Syrian affiliate, they said. Late Saturday, the U.N. spokesperson's office reported that "the situation on the ground is calm but tense' in the Golan.
The clashes came after Syrian rebel groups, including the Nusra Front, overran the Quneitra crossing — located on the frontier between Syrian and Israeli controlled parts of the Golan Heights — on Wednesday, seizing at least 44 Fijian peacekeepers. The Nusra Front also surrounded the nearby Rwihana and Breiqa encampments, where other U.N. peacekeepers were holed up.
The gunbattle began early Saturday at the Rwihana base some 1.5 miles (2.3 kilometers) from Quneitra, where 40 Filipino peacekeepers were surrounded by Nusra fighters who were ordering them to surrender, said Rami Abdurrahman of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The Philippines' Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin gave a similar account but did not name the armed group.
Abdurrahman, whose information comes from a network of activists throughout Syria, said he was not aware of any fatalities among the 40 Filipino peacekeepers in the Rwihana encampment as sporadic fighting continued throughout the day. A Philippine military spokesman, Lt. Col. Ramon Zagala, also said there were no casualties. The U.N. later reported that fighting at the base had stopped.
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"We may call it the greatest escape," Philippine military chief Gen. Gregorio Pio Catapang said. The peacekeepers became trapped after Syrian rebels entered the U.N.-patrolled buffer zone between Syria and Israel this week, seizing 44 Fijian soldiers and demanding that their Filipino colleagues surrender with their weapons. The Filipinos in two U.N. encampments refused and clashed with the rebels on Saturday. The first group of 35 peacekeepers was then successfully escorted out of a U.N. encampment in Breiqa by Irish and Filipino forces on board armored vehicles.
The remaining 40 peacekeepers were besieged at the second encampment called Rwihana by more than 100 gunmen who rammed the camp's gates with their trucks and fired mortar rounds. The Filipinos returned fire in self-defense, Philippine military officials said. At one point, Syrian government forces fired artillery rounds from a distance to prevent the Filipino peacekeepers from being overwhelmed, said Col. Roberto Ancan, a Philippine military official who helped monitor the tense standoff from the Philippine capital, Manila, and mobilize support for the besieged troops. "Although they were surrounded and outnumbered, they held their ground for seven hours," Catapang said in a news conference in Manila, adding there were no Filipino casualties. "We commend our soldiers for exhibiting resolve even while under heavy fire."
As night fell and a cease-fire took hold, the 40 Filipinos fled with their weapons, traveling across the chilly hills for nearly two hours, before meeting up with other U.N. forces, which escorted them to safety early Sunday, Philippine officials said. During the siege, the Philippine secretaries of defense and foreign affairs, along with the country's top military brass, gathered in a crisis room at the military headquarters in the capital to communicate with the Filipino forces and help guide them out of danger. The Syrian and Israeli governments, along with the United States and Qatar, provided support, the Philippine military said without elaborating. "If they held their ground, they could have been massacred because they were already running low on ammunition," Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin told The Associated Press. "So we discussed with them the option of escape and evasion."
In New York, The United Nations Disengagement Observer Force, or UNDOF, whose mission is to monitor a 1974 disengagement in the Golan Heights between Israel and Syria, reported that shortly after midnight local time, during a cease-fire agreed with the armed elements, all the 40 Filipino peacekeepers left their position and "arrived in a safe location one hour later." The Filipinos escaped during the cease-fire because they refused to agree to surrender as the insurgents demanded, Philippine military spokesman Lt. Col. Ramon Zagala said. The clashes erupted after Syrian rebel groups - including al-Qaida's Syrian affiliate, the Nusra Front - overran the Quneitra crossing on the frontier between Syrian and Israeli controlled parts of the Golan on Wednesday, seizing 44 Fijians.
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Fighters from the Nusra Front captured the Fijian troops late last month in the Syrian-controlled side of the Golan Heights, where a 1,200-strong U.N. force patrols the disputed buffer zone between Syria and Israel. The area along the frontier has since been engulfed in heavy clashes between the militants and the Syrian military. All 45 peacekeepers "are in good condition" and were being taken for a quick medical assessment, a U.N. statement said. The Fijians were taken hostage the same day that nearly 80 Filipino peacekeepers were trapped by Syrian opposition fighters. The Filipino peacekeepers later escaped.
The hostage crisis raised questions about the future of the decades-old U.N. Golan mission, as participating nations threatened to pull their troops out because of Syria's escalating violence. The Fijian troops were captured Aug. 28, a day after militants seized control of the Syrian side of the Quneitra crossing from President Bashar Assad's troops. U.N. Deputy Spokesman Farhan Haq said they were released at Syrian-side of the Quneitra crossing point near Israel. He told AP that they crossed into the Israeli-controlled Golan territory, were then taken to a U.N. post further north and would then go to Camp Faouar inside the Syrian-controlled Golan.
This image made from video posted on a militant social media account on Thursday, Sept. 11, 2014 shows U.N. peacekeepers from Fiji held captive by militants from the Nusra Front in Syria. Al-Qaida-linked Syrian rebels on Thursday released all 45 Fijian peacekeepers they had held captive for two weeks, the United Nations said, bringing an end to a crisis that had pulled the U.N. monitoring force into the chaos of Syria's civil war. Arabic reads, "we truly understand the limited resources that Nusra Front have."
Qatar's Foreign Ministry said it played a role in winning the release of the peacekeepers through mediation. Qatar said it became involved at at Fiji's request. The official Qatar News Agency reported late Thursday that the tiny Arab Gulf emirate had "succeeded in the release of the Fijian soldiers." U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon welcomed the release of the peacekeepers and thanked the efforts of "all concerned," without naming anyone, according to his office. Israel's Channel Two news reported that the Fijians were given food and medical attention after crossing into Israeli-controlled territory. An unidentified peacekeeper expressed relief. "We're all very happy to be safe and alive," he told the Israeli channel.
The same day the Fijians were taken captive, two groups of Filipino peacekeepers were trapped at separate U.N. encampments, surrounded by rebel fighters who demanded they surrender. They refused, and both groups of Philippine troops eventually escaped - one busting out with the help of Irish colleagues, and the other by slipping away under the cover of darkness. At U.N. headquarters, the Fijians' release was greeted with relief and renewed indignation. Fiji's U.N. Mission tweeted a photo of diplomats celebrating with their thumbs up, reading: "Free at last! Thumbs up from the Fiji Permanent Mission in New York to our 45 brave Fijian UNDOF peacekeepers." Jordan's U.N. Ambassador Dina Kawar said the idea of peacekeepers being taken hostage "is just impossible to accept because it will happen more and more, and that will make countries hesitant about sending their armies, so we were very happy."
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