December 21, 1999. Copyright 1999. Graphic News. All rights reserved.

GOLAN Ð THE KEY TO PEACE

LONDON, December 21, Graphic News: ISRAEL OCCUPIED the Golan Heights, located in southern Syria, during the 1967 six-day war, formally annexing the area 14 years later. The war displaced most of the areaÕs 150,000 inhabitants Ð farmers and fisherman who lived around the Sea of Galilee Ð causing an exodus unseen in any other land occupied by the Jewish state.

Following the Israeli conquest of the Golan, which was in response to years of spasmodic artillery bombardment by Syria, the first Israeli settlers moved onto occupied land. Today, around 17,000 live there.

Now the fate of the plateau is being decided at the first high-level peace talks between Syria and Israel in 50 years, which are set to resume on January 3 near Washington. Syria and arch-foe Israel are talking peace again.

The return of the Golan is an obsession for SyriaÕs ageing president, Hafez al-Assad, who still considers Damascus to be at war with Israel. A full withdrawal from the strategic plateau remains SyriaÕs indisputable condition for peace.

Syrian Foreign Minister Farouq al-Shara, who led SyriaÕs delegation in preliminary talks with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak in Washington, carried a list of additional Òpeace componentsÓ: security guarantees, the nature and timing of peace, and water issues.

Some intelligence sources believe that the ailing Assad may settle for peace in order to smooth the way for his son Bashar to succeed him.

Bashar, 35, who trained as an opthalmologist in London, catapulted into the limelight after his elder brother, Basel, whom Assad had built up as a potential heir, was killed in a car crash in 1994.

Other observers claim 68-year-old Assad will stall any deal with Barak because peace could bring early elections and unacceptably weaken his minority Alawite religious regime. Peace could bring the dangers of Western influence, more freedom and democracy for Syrians.

On the other side of the Golan stands Ehud Barak who, elected on a pledge to make peace with Syria and Lebanon, faces his own set of problems.

Barak has committed himself to a public referendum on any future peace deal as well as withdrawing Israeli armed forces from the south Lebanon Òsecurity zoneÓ by July 2000 and reaching a permament peace settlement with Palestinians by September 2000.

These pledges pivot on swapping Israeli-occupied land Ð the Golan Ð for peace, an anathema to the Jewish settlers and hawks in the Knesset who see it as a wholesale sell-out of the Zionist ideal.

Without a package deal with Syria, withdrawal from south Lebanon would make IsraelÕs northern villages vulnerable to rocket attack by Syrian-backed, Lebanese Hizbullah guerrillas. Syria is the main power broker in Lebanon with 35,000 troops stationed there. It maintains a firm grip on the politics of its smaller neighbour and both countries coordinate on peace-making.

Using its leverage over Hizbullah in Lebanon, Syria could lift pressure on Barak for the wider peace settlement.

Lebanon, whose own peace talks with Israel also stalled four years ago, is expected to join the talks in Washington very soon, probably after the second round of talks in January.

The U.S.-sponsored talks have sparked euphoria among Syrians with Mr al-Shara saying that a framework deal could be struck by mid February with a full agreement by September.

This would be music to the ears of the Golan refugees who have lived for the last 32 years in ugly, grey camps of concrete and corrugated sheeting scattered across SyriaÕs Damascus plain. It would also fit perfectly with President ClintonÕs plans to clinch a peace deal between Israel, Syria and the Lebanon as his final foreign policy success before America votes for a new president in November.

/ENDS

Sources: Reuters, Associated Press, JaneÕs Defence Weekly, IISS