Peace deal draft defining Golan as Syrian triggers fury in Jerusalem

T. Belman. Its seems to me that Israel should have occupied the Syrian side of the Golan thereby being an opposition party entitled to participate in the current discussions. We could always agree to retreat from such newly acquired territories in exchange for a peace agreement where the Israeli Golan is ceded to Israel. I’m dreaming, I know. The world will never let us have it. But then again we could have invited those groups like the Druze to come and live there forever in exchange for a mutual defense agreement.

Vowing to stymie language in accord being hammered out by world powers, Netanyahu raises issue with Kerry, plans to discuss it with Putin, TV report says

TOI

Benjamin Netanyahu seen during a security and defense tour in the Golan Heights, near the Northern Israeli border with Syria. April 11, 2016. (Kobi Gideon/GPO)
Benjamin Netanyahu seen during a security and defense tour in the Golan Heights, near the Northern Israeli border with Syria. April 11, 2016. (Kobi Gideon/GPO)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is reportedly fuming over indications that plans for a negotiated settlement for Syria, being worked on with the support of the US, Russia and other major world powers, could specify that the entire Golan Heights, including the western two-thirds of the strategic ridge captured by Israel in 1967, is Syrian land.

Netanyahu discussed the issue in a telephone call with US Secretary of State John Kerry a few days ago, a Channel 10 TV news report said Monday. He will also discuss the matter when he travels to Russia next week to meet with President Vladimir Putin.

The TV report said that the Prime Minister’s Office had confirmed that Netanyahu was concerned over the issue, that he had made clear that any such language would be unacceptable to Israel, and that he would “act to ensure” any agreement included no such provision.

Israel was frequently attacked from the Golan in its first two decades of statehood, captured the Heights in the 1967 war, and extended Israeli law to the area in 1981, a move tantamount to annexation.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meets with Israeli soldiers in the Golan Heights during a tour of the area on April 11, 2016. (Kobi Gideon/GPO)

Prior to to the eruption of the Syrian civil war, some Israeli security chiefs had encouraged the Israeli political leadership to explore the possibility of reaching a peace treaty with President Bashar Assad, which could also have enabled a treaty with Lebanon and the isolating of Assad’s key ally Iran, in return for relinquishing the Golan. Since Syria descended into civil war chaos and mass slaughter, however, the notion of Israel relinquishing the strategic high ground has become highly improbable.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the Golan on Monday. During his tour, he said Israel has carried out dozens of strikes against Hezbollah and associated targets in Syria to prevent the Lebanese group from obtaining advanced weapons. Israeli officials have warned that Hezbollah and Iranian fighters may try to set up a base across the border, on the Syrian-held eastern one-third of the Golan, to launch attacks against Israelis.

April 14, 2016 | 6 Comments »

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  1. Had Israel listened to Kahane and annexed all of the “Occupied Territories” back in 1967, the world would have thrown a Temper Tantrum For The Ages…but the issue would have been resolved.

    Instead, Israel decided to negotiate Land For Peace. How well is that strategy working?

    It is not too late, and there is no time like the present. Israel should annex everything gained in 1967, plus Iran. When the world indignantly objects, we can compromise by negotiating the terms for giving back Iran.

  2. Actually according to Halakhah, most, but not all of, Syria is part of Eretz Yisrael including, but not limited to, the Golan, Hama(th), Palmyra/Tadmor, the area in North Syria between the Kurdish enclaves and so forth.

  3. @ ArnoldHarris: The Arabs in large numbers would only get expelled in the context of a serious and bloody war. Israel is not in peril currently.

    The strength Israel has in comparison to the Palestinians is that if Israel was pushed too far they would suffer grave consequences. Unfortunately they do have the ability to inflict harm on individuals and I do not want to minimize this. The situation thus is not ideal but very far from perilous. It was perilous in 1948. It was perilous in 1967 and in 1973.

  4. The problem is not anybody or everybody else’s Jew-hatred. The problem is the meekness and timidity of all governments of Israel going back to the start of the Zionist movement, which in itself followed similar traits that characterized Jews and their communal leadership cadres for the previous 2000 years.

    Power alone is the sole condition of successful national independence. Without power, you are nothing, and you exist solely on the will of your enemies. And power is gained only at the expense of other and competing nations.

    Never allow yourselves to forget the territorial imperative, which alone determines growth or day, life or death, of plant and animal species, or even human beings and entire nations.

    The Jewish nation, now precariously in control of Eretz-Yisrael, Israel must steel itself to mercilessness and implacability in dealing with enemies of the Jewish nation and the Jewish state, and must cease conducting itself as the world’s punching bag.

    Take the land. Keep the land. Either expel the non-Jews or degrade them exactly as Jews were degraded through the ages.

    Do all this successfully, and the world that despised you will transform itself into the world that will lick Jewish asses for the sake of winning your approval.

    All of you reading this will first think how nasty this old man Arnold Harris must be. And nasty I am indeed. Because I have purposely modeled my deportment on the basis of the ways of life of all things organic, and of the nations. And I know that without power, there is nothing but degradation, decay, defeat, and death unto extinction.

    Arnold Harris, Outspeaker

  5. In the real world whatever they put on paper will not matter. Facts on the ground matter most.

    This is also why it is more important in Judah/Samaria + East Jerusalem to build and have Jews move in. This is more important than annexation.

    Establish facts and then get around to annexation.

  6. And Obama continues his Jew hatred and pressure on Israel in the hopes of achieving his long unrequited Leftist orgasm.