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This may be the Boy President's chance to get the Golan back.

The Iranians can't do that for him, only we and the Izzies can.

If Bush, Condi, and Olmert can deliver the Syrians, plus a guarantee of Lebanese neutrality, this effectively flips the entire strategic situation in the Arab world and isolates the Persians. Larijani's strategy will be scotched.

The bride price, of course, is a slow strangulation of the Hariri investigation. Nasrallah would be forgiven for his war and become a very powerful man in ME politics and in Lebanon itself. Bush and Condi's reputations would skyrocket overnight. I can see why there has been no activity.

Hamas would end up having to play the spoiler-stooge for Iranian interests or play ball.

Be Seeing You,

Chris

This could be pretty huge.

Getting the Golan back is #1 for Asad. His father never did it, he couldn't do it. If Bashar can get it back, he cements his rule and becomes an instant hero of Syria.

However, the whole "park" thing doesn't quite fit. I have trouble seeing Asad agreeing to getting back the Golan then turning around and making it into a park for Israelis. I would think that once Syria gets it back, they'd want it for themselves and to still allow the Jews to come and picnic there would seem to be an indignity I would think the Syrians would want to avoid.

Tossing out Hamas and cutting off Hezbollah also seems to be a high order.

But who knows? Syria is weak. Asad has to know that if he sticks with his current posture it's nothing but more of the same and another 40 years of isolation until he dies. Without getting back the Golan.

A deal with Syria would also involve Lebanon and most likely a return of Shebba Frams. Although, once Israel goves back the Golan, it doesn't really make any sense to be haggling over Shebba Farms.

An interesting idea is that Syria is the master of the political assassination. They did it with Gemayel in 1983, they did it with Hariri and Pierre Gemayel. Perhaps as part of the deal, Nasrallah would be removed from the scene.

This might be a China scenario. Everyone credits Resgan with winning the Cold War, and he did a lot. But prying China from the Soviet orbit and taking advantage of the Sino-Soviet split was a sine qua non of victory. If the USSR and PRC had remained a united front, things would have been very different.

All in all, if true, the future will be very interesting.

You don't isolate Iran by "delivering" Syria, you isolate and practically destroy Syrian regime by "delivering" Iran... which has to happen anyway, which is why Syria by itself is just a diversion and is not worth time and money to deal with, and why it's still "untouched".

"Domino principle" assures that regime change in Iran will precipitate regime or attitude change in Syria, Lebanon and elsewhere around Israel.

The Gordian Knot is in Tehran, everything else is just exercises and hot air.

Anyway, this sounds fishy on the face of it, Golan only makes sense to Syria as a strategic point for attacking Israel, not planting parks and providing security to make sure tourists don't litter.