Israel, Syria Confirm Indirect Peace Talks
Israel and Syria on Wednesday said they are holding indirect peace talks through Turkish mediators - the first official confirmation of contacts between the longtime enemies.
In statements issued minutes apart, the two governments said they "have declared their intent to conduct these talks in good faith and with an open mind," with a goal of reaching "a comprehensive peace."
Both nations thanked Turkey for its help, and Turkey issued its own confirmation. Muslim Turkey has good ties with both Israel and Syria.
There have been media reports and broad hints from Israeli officials in recent months of new Israeli-Syrian contacts through Turkey, and Turkey's foreign minister said earlier this month that his country was trying to bring the sides together. But this was the first official confirmation that contacts have actually resumed.
An Israeli government official said Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's chief of staff and diplomatic adviser have been in Turkey since Monday.
"In parallel their Syrian counterparts are in Turkey as well," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the talks. He declined to discuss the substance of the talks.
CBS News' George Baghdadi, reporting from Damascus, said the Syrian government had released a statement confirming the talks on Wednesday. "Syria and Israel have begun indirect peace negotiations under Turkish auspices," said the statement by Syria's Foreign Ministry.
Turkey's NTV television also said the Israeli and Syrian delegations were in Istanbul but not meeting directly. Instead, it said Turkish mediators were shuttling between them.
Israel and Syria are bitter enemies whose attempts at reaching peace have repeatedly failed in the past, most recently in 2000. CBS News correspondent Robert Berger reports that those talks failed over the scope of an Israeli withdrawal from the strategic Golan Heights.
The nations have fought three wars, and their forces have also clashed in Lebanon.
Peace with Syria would require Israel to withdraw from the Golan Heights, a plateau Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast war and later annexed. Today, the heights are home to 18,000 Israelis and roughly the same number of Druse Arabs who regard themselves as Syrian nationals. Syrian and Israeli forces are separated by U.N. peacekeepers.
Berger reports that the right wing Israeli opposition is furious over Olmert's apparent willingness to negotiate over ownership of the heights.
A committee representing Israeli settlers on the Golan said Olmert's move "put the State of Israel's survival at risk."
"The people of Israel will not support such a deluded and irresponsible move, which would hand over such a vital Israeli strategic asset to the Arab axis of evil," the Golan Residents Council said.
Israelis generally regard the Golan as an important buffer against Syrian attack. With its wineries and small inns, the Golan is also a popular destination for Israeli tourists. Just weeks ago, Olmert spent a vacation in the Golan. Weakened by a corruption investigation, Olmert could face a tough time selling a Golan withdrawal to the public.
In other developments:
Peace talks with Syria also could divert attention from newly relaunched Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, which aim to reach an agreement by the end of the year.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said, however, that the Palestinians welcomed the latest news. "We want to reach a comprehensive peace and therefore we support talks between Israel and Syria," he said.
The Israeli government official who spoke with The Associated Press said the talks with Syria "will not be at the expense of the Palestinian track."
Israel, meanwhile, has demanded that Syria - which offers refuge to militant groups like Hamas and Islamic Jihad and supports the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah - distance itself from them, and from its Iranian ally, as a condition for talks. That condition appears to have been dropped.
Last September, Israeli warplanes carried out an attack on Syria, targeting an installation that the U.S. has said was an unfinished nuclear reactor built by North Korea. And in February, a top Hezbollah commander was assassinated in the Syrian capital in an attack widely assumed to have been engineered by Israel.
Stuart Tuttle, a spokesman for the U.S. embassy in Israel, called the new talks "Israel's decision."
"It isn't something the U.S. is directly involved in," Tuttle said.
U.S. relations with Syria have been frosty for years because of Syria's meddling in Lebanon, support for militant groups in the Palestinian territories and Iraq and ties with Iran.
Itamar Rabinovich, who served as an Israeli negotiator in the last round of talks with Syria, said Syria "is not as interested in making peace with Israel as it is in making peace with Washington."
But Israel and the U.S., he said, are unlikely to move ahead with talks unless Syria "disengages" from Iran.
"No Israeli government wants Iran in the Golan Heights," he said.