"If you do not want peace with Syria keep the Golan Heights, but do not expect to have peace with Syria and do not expect them to sit quietly and do nothing and not support Hizbullah,"
Indyk, you forgot option "C".
Posted on 09/07/2004 4:27:57 PM PDT by yonif
If Israel wants peace with Syria it has to give up the Golan Heights, said former US ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk to the Israeli media during his visit to Kazakhstan on Tuesday.
"You live in the Middle East, so that is your neighbor. If you want peace with Syria you have to give them back the Golan Heights.
"If you do not want peace with Syria keep the Golan Heights, but do not expect to have peace with Syria and do not expect them to sit quietly and do nothing and not support Hizbullah," said Indyk who directs the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institute.
"Don't expect them to simply accept it, because you wouldn't if you were them," said Indyk. It doesn't belong to Israel, it belongs to Syria, he added.
Bad timing has kept it in Israel's hands, he said. For years before his death in 2000, Syrian leader Hafez Assad believed that peace was a strategic option. He didn't have the means to challenge Israeli militarily with the backing that he once had from the former Soviet Union, said Indyk. But trading the Golan Heights for peace would have shaken his internal hold on the country, said Indyk.
"Peace was threatening to his hold on power and his hold on power was more important than getting the Golan back," said Indyk.
As a result, even though former prime ministers Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres, Binyamin Netanyahu, and Ehud Barak all offered him full withdrawal, he refused. When he was dying in December 1999, Assad went for the deal.
"He was ready, but Barak was not. When Barak was ready, it was too late," said Indyk.
It was a tragedy, which Indyk believes helped lead to the present violence.
If a deal with Syria had gone through, "Camp David would have been a different story," said Indyk. Peace with Syria would have led to peace with Lebanon.
"Other Arab nations would have normalized their relations with Israel," he said. "[Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser] Arafat would have been scared that he was going to miss the boat," said Indyk, and he would have had no choice but to make concessions at Camp David in the summer of 2000.
Another failed mealy-mouthed meddler.
He's a comedian too?
Let me guess, a clinton appointee?
I am aware of a recent comment by an Israeli general that the Golan is not essential to Israel's security. I find that incredible myself, but perhaps someone with a more on-the-ground viewpoint could enlighten me.
What a fool. The clinton administration did as much damage as they could.
Nonsense.
The Golan, forever Israel!
Doesn't Syria hold Lebanon?
Well let's just give California back to Mexico, eh Martin?
The solution of course is to take the rest of Syria and wreak havoc and make the Syrians really glad to have their country back, minus of course the Golan Heights.
Syria now doesn't matter. It is being squeezed from Iraq and Lebanon and has more to worry about than Isreal.
The main reason for capturing Raq and Saddam was to liberate Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Iran. Once the status quo is changed life will be bertter for the whole area.
"If you do not want peace with Syria keep the Golan Heights, but do not expect to have peace with Syria and do not expect them to sit quietly and do nothing and not support Hizbullah,"
Indyk, you forgot option "C".
I have been to the Golan Heights. Israel might just as well announce its dissolution as a nation if it gives this area back to Syria.
Yeah they do.
They stole it fair and square.
Alternately it is legitimate war booty captured when Syria invaded them.
So9
yes, he was a Clinton appointee that had to get his CITIZENSHIP FIRST! He is/was a British citizen and Clinton rushed his papers thru!
Imagine that. Well if I would have read the whole thing, I would have seen he works for the Brookings inst. That should have been the tip-off..
They do now!!!
Well then he should have no problem with giving Northern Ireland back to the Irish Republic.
How moronic; There wasn't peace when the when the Israelis didn't have the Golan Heights.
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