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Dr. Aaron Lerner is co-founder of , Independent Media Review and Analysis, an Israel-based news organization which provides an extensive digest of media, polls and significant interviews and events relating to the Israeli-Arab conflict.
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By Dr. Aaron Lerner
May 24, 2008
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"I do not know how to work out a security arrangement if Israel actually withdraws from the Golan Heights. To the best of my knowledge there is no solution to this. And in the absence of a solution to this matter, we could find ourselves in the situation that you are basing yourself only on the good will of the other side. And in the Middle East, with the kind of regime of Bashar Assad, and also with the problematic nature of that regime - that it could be replaced by a Sunni regime within a relatively short period of time, you are taking an unreasonable level of risk.
Gen. (ret) Giora Eiland, former head of Israel's National Security Council - Israel Radio interview - Evening news magazine 22 May 2008
Unfortunately, Eiland has many former colleagues who suggest doing just that: "The support of Israel's defense establishment of the talks with Syria is based on the ... view that when Assad gives his word he keeps it."
Haaretz correspondent Amos Harel 22 May 2008
Simply put, elites in the defense establishment support a deal with Syria on the basis of reasoning that has absolutely nothing to do with their area of expertise. Many of these same people seriously erred in previous predictions regarding developments in the region in general and Syria in particular. But that doesn't stop them from religiously supporting withdrawal from the Golan.
Many of them were convinced, for example, that Syria's billions of dollars of unpaid bills to the Russian arms industry would prevent them from acquiring any substantial or significant new weapons systems for the foreseeable future. Oops. They were dead wrong.
Many of them cited various and sundry gizmos that could take the place of the Golan. Gizmos that have since been addressed by other gizmos.
And of course, many of them assumed absolute best case scenarios when considering how post withdrawal security arrangements would play out in the event of an emergency. If nothing else, the Second Lebanon War sent an expensive reminder that reality rarely is the best case scenario.
Is a peace treaty impossible without leaving the Golan?
Interestingly, the very same country acting as go between in the Syria-Israel talks, proved that it is indeed possible for Syria to forego what it considers to be sovereign Syrian territory.
[Wikipedia: "Under the leadership of Syrian Presdident Bashar al Assad from 2000 onwards there was a lessening of tensions between Turkey and Syria over the Hatay issue. Indeed, in early 2005, when visits from Turkish President Ahmet Necdet Sezer and Turkish prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan opened a way to discussions between two states, it was claimed that the Syrian government announced it had no claims to sovereignty concerning Hatay any more."]
As Channel 2's analyst for Arab affairs, Ehud Ya'ari, asked Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul at a Jerusalem press conference in early January 2005: "Can Syria's recognition last month of full Turkish sovereignty over the Hatay province [Alexandretta] be seen as a precedent for the case of the Golan Heights?"
Indeed.
Views expressed by the author do not
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