Held at gunpoint: BBC team detained by Israeli forces in southern Syria

On the morning of 9 May, I was part of a BBC Arabic team which left the Syrian capital, Damascus, for the southern province of Deraa. From there we planned to go to the frontier with the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

We wanted to get close to the Syrian territory that has been seized by the Israeli military since December, when Israel's prime minister said it was taking control indefinitely of a demilitarised buffer zone and neighbouring areas following the fall of Bashar al-Assad's regime.

We were a team of seven – myself (a British citizen), two Iraqi BBC staff, and four Syrians – three freelancers and one BBC cameraman.