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Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has rejected a Syrian overture to open peace negotiations. (AP file)
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| By Israel Insider staff and partners September 28, 2006 |
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Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert rejected Thursday a purported Syrian overture to open peace negotiations, accusing the leadership in Damascus of harboring Palestinian terrorists.
Olmert has repeatedly rejected at doubletalk Syrian President Bashar Assad's recent statements that he desires peace with Israel, saying that so long as he allows Palestinian militant groups, including the Islamic Hamas group and Islamic Jihad, to take refuge in Damascus negotiations are impossible.
"These are reasons that even Syria's statements that it is interested in negotiations cannot be taken seriously," Olmert told Israel Radio. "It (Syria) was and remains the main supporter of the Palestinian terror groups who daily try to carry out terrorism against the state of Israel. In my opinion, this is not a foundation on which it is possible to hold peace negotiations."
In an interview Assad gave to the German weekly Der Spiegel last week, he said, "We want to make peace -- peace with Israel."
Olmert also said Thursday that he does not foresee another violent conflict between Israel and Hezbollah in the near future.
The prime minister credited the Israel Defense Forces, which waged a month-long war against Hezbollah in the summer, with changing the reality in Lebanon, making it unlikely that the guerrilla group will engage in anything beyond small border skirmishes with Israel.
"I do not rule out that the sources that activated Hezbollah from the beginning, the Iranians and to some degree the Syrians, will make every effort to activate them in the future, and it could be that as a result we can expect tests," Olmert said.
"But, in my opinion, the chance that Hezbollah will be dragged into a broad military conflict of the type that we had is very small. The reality has changed and Hezbollah knows this well," Olmert added.
The war that erupted July 12 after Hezbollah carried out a cross-border raid, killing three soldiers and capturing two others, ended without a clear victor.
The AP contributed to this report.
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