| Posted
By Emma Sabry
Israel should
seize the opportunity to revive peace
talks with Syria while there is a real
chance of success, or risk further
destabilizing the Middle East,
concluded a new report by the
International Crisis Group, an
independent, non-profit,
non-governmental organization aimed at
preventing and resolving deadly
conflicts.
The report, titled “Restarting
Israeli-Syrian Negotiations”,
examined prospects for renewing peace
negotiations between Syria and Israel
against the backdrop of regional
developments, including last
summer’s conflict between Israel and
the Lebanese resistance movement
Hezbollah and the re-launch of the
Arab peace initiative at the Arab
League summit last March.
Although the Israeli-Syrian
conflict is not the region’s
costliest, it has maintained tensions
in the Middle East and could lead to
another armed conflict between the two
countries, the report states.
Peace talks between Israel and
Syria collapsed in 2000, mainly over
Israeli refusal to return the Golan
Heights, a strategic plateau in
southwestern Syria that Israel seized
in the 1967 Middle East War and
unilaterally annexed in 1981. More
than 15,000 Israeli settlers are now
living in the Golan along with 16,000
Syrians who remained in a small number
of villages there.
The Israeli government refuses to
comply with UN Resolutions 242 and 338
that call for the complete withdrawal
from occupied Arab territories, as
well as Resolution 479 which confirms
the illegality of Israel's annexation
of the Golan.
The Crisis Group’s report
examines Israel’s possible reasons
for holding on to the Golan – such
as the strength of the settler
population and the territory’s role
as a security-buffer. “But the
benefits of peace far outweigh those
of continued occupation”, says
Nicolas Pelham, Crisis Group’s
Senior Analyst in Israel.
“Recent regional developments
have made an Israeli-Syrian agreement
more urgent, more important and more
attainable,” Pelham added.
Syria has repeatedly signaled
its readiness to resume talks
with Israel without any preconditions.
But the obstacles to a peace deal
appear daunting, including a U.S.
administration intent on isolating
Syria and a weak Israeli government
that has conditioned any dialogue on a
broad change in Damascus’ policy:
severing ties to Palestinian
resistance group Hamas and Lebanon’s
Hezbollah resistance movement and
altering its relationship with Iran.
According to the Crisis Group,
Syria’s regional posture and
relationships with Hamas, Hezbollah
and Iran would inevitably change
following a peace deal. In other
words, what Israel demands could
potentially be achieved, but only as
part of a final deal, not as
preconditions for it.
While official resistance to
negotiations is clear in Israel,
Syria’s appetite for peace talks is
diminishing – a result of repeated
Israeli rebuffs.
“Rejecting Syria’s overtures is
a mistake which is fast on its way to
becoming a missed opportunity”,
warns Peter Harling, Crisis Group’s
Senior Analyst in Damascus. “The
mood in Damascus is turning decidedly
skeptical, and the regime is reverting
to its more cautious habits. Mirroring
Israeli doubts on Syria’s
seriousness, officials here are deeply
disillusioned with Israel, questioning
its ability and readiness to negotiate
in earnest”.
The Crisis Group’s report was
released days before Syria distanced
itself from comments made by a
Syrian-American businessman who
recently told Israeli MPs that he had
been at the heart of unofficial peace
talks with Israel. “The statements
and the ideas of the American-Syrian
Ibrahim Suleiman do not reflect the
point of view of Syria, which has
repeated many times its refusal to
undertake secret negotiations"
with Israel, a Syrian foreign
ministry official was quoted as
saying.
Last Thursday, Suleiman told a top
Israeli parliamentary panel that he
and former Israeli foreign ministry
director general Alon Liel headed two
years of secret talks between the two
countries during which understandings
were reached for a peace agreement
that he said could be struck within
six months.
"Our work is done, now it's up
to officials in Israel and Syria to
sit down and iron out their
differences," Suleiman said.
"We gave them a peace map.”
“Syria's President Bashar al-Assad
wants peace with Israel. He wants to
make peace and be known as the man of
peace," he stressed.
Despite Syria’s rejection of
Suleiman’s comments, one fact
remains clear: Syria is willing to
resume official talks with Israel,
which should seize the opportunity
before it’s too late.
The mere fact of Syrians
negotiating with Israelis would have
positive effects in a region where
popular opinion is moving away from
acceptance of Israel’s right to
exist. The onset of a peace process
between the two states could also make
Hamas and Hezbollah adapt their
policies in response to signs of a
changing Syrian-Israeli relationship.
The same holds for Iran: Syria would
be unlikely to cut ties with its
closest ally for two decades but
Tehran would have to adjust its
behavior when there is a prospect
of a peace agreement.
Moreover, resuming talks with Syria
would help ongoing efforts to revive
the Arab peace initiative, which calls
for normalization of ties with Israel
in exchange for its withdrawal from
Arab land seized in the 1967 war.
The Crisis Group also called on
Quartet members to press for
renewed Syrian-Israeli negotiations.
While both the U.S. and Israel may
prefer to give precedence to the
Palestinian over the Syrian conflict,
lack of movement on the latter
inevitably will hamper the former, the
Crisis group said.
A number of recommendations to
remove obstacles to the resumption of
Israeli-Syrian peace talks were
presented in the Crisis Group report
and restated in the unofficial peace
initiative involving Suleiman and
Alon Liel. Under such conditions,
there is little justification for
Israel to put off peace talks – and
even less justification for the U.S.
to oppose them.
“Israel-Syria peace negotiations
would profoundly alter regional
atmospherics. A peace deal would
fundamentally transform them”, says
Robert Malley, Crisis Group’s Middle
East Program Director. “This
opportunity may not last forever. It
should not be wasted”.
- Recommendations of
the Crisis Group:
To the Israeli government:
1. Respond positively to
Syria’s unconditional offer to
resume peace negotiations.
2. Halt efforts to augment
settler presence in the Golan.
3. Facilitate family reunions
for Syrian nationals living in the
Golan and lift restrictions on visits
to Syria by Israeli nationals.
To the Syrian government:
4. Support Arab League
efforts to explain and market its
peace initiative to Western and
Israeli audiences.
5. Engage in public diplomacy
by: (a) restating clearly that
Syria is ready to negotiate without
any precondition; (b) giving select
Syrian officials a clear mandate to
disseminate both Syria’s version of
past negotiations and its current
position; (c) committing to provide
information on Israeli soldiers
missing in action and return the
remains of executed Israeli spy Eli
Cohen in the early stages of resumed
negotiations; and (d) facilitating
access to Syria for Israeli nationals
with relatives or ancestral roots in
Syria, including Israelis of
Palestinian and Syrian origin.
To the members of the Quartet
(U.S., UN, EU and Russia):
6. Press for renewed
Israeli-Syrian negotiations, beginning
by holding parallel discussions with
both sides.
|
