With U.S. Secretary of State Warren Christopher due in the Middle East next week to continue American mediation efforts between Jerusalem and Damascus, Israeli officials say they will agree to resume direct peace talks with Syria only if there is something to talk about.
The issue of direct Israeli-Syrian negotiations, which were broken off last February, resurfaced this week when Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk al-Sharaa said that Israel had turned down a Syrian offer to resume direct negotiations in Washington.
Speaking in Brussels, Sharaa said the issue was raised during President Hafez Assad’s talks with President Clinton last month in Damascus.
“There was a negative answer from Israel’s side,” Sharaa told reporters. “Syria has openly stated she is ready to resume peace talks if Israel responds positively to the results of the Clinton-Assad meeting, but there has been no such response.”
Sharaa also said his country would normalize relations with Israel if Israel fully withdrew from the Golan Heights. His remark was believed to be the first time a Syrian officials spoke of establishing normalized relations with Israel.
But in Israel, officials said the Syrians have still not done enough to begin a serious dialogue.
Speaking to a close forum of Labor Knesset members, Rabin reportedly said that there has been no progress on a number of crucial issues, including security arrangements, the phases of an Israeli withdrawal from the Golan and normalization of ties.
The Prime Minister’s Office has stated that without high-level direct negotiations at the ministerial level there will not be substantial progress on the Syrian track.
Rabin has also suggested that the clock is ticking toward a deadline on negotiations with Damascus.
“If there is no progress in the Israeli-Syrian track by the end of 1995, a peace agreement between the two countries will not be reached during the tenure of this government,” he was quoted as saying in the Israeli daily Davar. Elections are scheduled for 1996.
Meanwhile, in the absence of any direct talks, Christopher is scheduled to conduct his sixth round of shuttle diplomacy between Damascus and Jerusalem. He is scheduled to arrive in the region of Monday.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
