Alwaght- The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a controversial decision on Saturday April 16 has said that the cabinet’s weekly session, normally held every Sunday, would be held in the occupied Golan Heights. Netanyahu asserted that the Israeli regime had no plan, neither for now nor for the future, to retreat from the Syrian occupied territory. Netanyahu publicized his decision in a recent meeting with the US Secretary of State John Kerry, adding that this issue would be of priority in meeting with the Russian President Vladimir Putin during his upcoming visit to Moscow. Netanyahu in a 17 April cabinet session has repeated his claim about the occupied Golan Heights, saying that the world after 50 years should recognize the Israeli control over the Golan Heights as part of the Israeli territory.
Earlier, on April 11 the Israeli PM, during a trip to the occupied territory to visit the Israeli military units there, had said that Golan Heights would remain an “integral part” of the Israeli regime. Located in southwest of Syria with a size of 35,000 square kilometers , Golan Heights link the separate Levant region’s areas including Syria, Lebanon, Palestine and Jordan. On June 5, 1967, Tel Aviv, during a surprise military assault against the Arab countries, seized the Syrian Golan Heights territory. During the 1973 war, Syria managed to take back 664 square kilometers of its occupied territory from the Israeli regime. The rest of the seized Syrian region remained under Tel Aviv’s control so far, however.
The world community to date refrained from recognition of Golan Heights as an Israeli territory.
The region has rich water sources. Militarily speaking, the Golan Heights overlook the Syrian capital Damascus and should be fully under the Israeli regime’s control, it could help Tel Aviv make up for its strategic depth weakness.
Yitzhak Rabin, former PM of the Israeli regime, believed that losing Golan territory would mean losing the security of the Israeli regime as a whole.
Since its establishment, Tel Aviv had a special geopolitical interest in Golan Heights. The Israeli officials always tried to turn Golan an integral part of their political geography, but this is the first time in 49 years that an Israeli government is holding meeting in the occupied Syrian territory. During the past few days, the Israeli officials have taken strong positions on keeping Golan Heights in grasp of Tel Aviv, giving out a growing concern raised by the Israeli regime. DEBKAfile website, known for its links to the Israeli military intelligence services, maintained that the major cause of Tel Aviv’s concerns was a behind-the-scenes agreement between Washington and Moscow to return Golan Heights to Syria during Geneva negotiations and form a new Syrian government.
DEBKAfile wrote that its intelligence sources in Moscow reported that the Israeli officials as well as top military commanders become surprised to hear on the weekend that the US President Barack Obama and his Russian counterpart agreed on returning the Golan territory to Syria. Some published reports suggest that the Russian foreign minister and the US Secretary of State, with prior agreement of Obama and Putin, added a proposal to return the Golan Heights to Syria as part of the Geneva peace process to end the war in Syria.
According to the Israeli website’s claims, the current American and Russian approach on the Golan Heights is a continuation of the two countries’ approach on independence of the Kurds north of Syria despite a Turkish opposition. Depending on the Israeli intelligence sources’ reports, DEBKAfile added that new Obama and Putin military and diplomatic behavior on Syria started. Bashar Assad’s stepping down and gradual settlement of Golan Heights issue in a single-year process are among the Russian-American accords and Tel Aviv at the end of the road should retreat from the Golan Heights, according to the Israeli website.
The Israeli regime’s behavior in the past shows that Tel Aviv launches a massive propaganda campaign even about trivial issues which have links to its security environment. A good instance is the presence of al-Nusra Front in the Golan borders which according to some of the analysts is in connection with Tel Aviv and creates a security buffer zone for the Israeli regime. The experts say return of Golan Heights to Syria would mean entrance of the Axis of Resistance to an environment close to the Israeli regime. This could pose a big security challenge to the Israeli regime. Therefore, the new strong stance of the Israeli officials comes from their feeling of the danger of the Axis of Resistance getting close to their security environment. This Israeli position on Golan Heights was not an unexpected issue, but what looked much unexpected was the Arab officials and media turning a blind eye to the issue, which brought them under fire of such independent Arab journalists as Abdel Bari Atwan. Atwan said that Netanyahu’s obscenity and humiliation of the Arabs has reached to a degree that he calls the 19-year presence of Syria after its independence in the Golan Heights an "occupation." "I don’t know if the Arab leaders have phoned Netanyahu to congratulate him for his move and remarks on Golan Heights because they are allies of the Israelis in a new alliance and it is no surprise if I see them do this," continued sarcastically Atwan.
It is well felt that Syria faces a risk of split under different titles the most obvious of which is federalization. The major purpose of partition is to drive Damascus out of its role as a regional power in the face of the Israeli occupation. Some of the figures of the Syrian opposition call Tel Aviv as a friend and ally of them. Some others still vow that should the Israeli regime takes action to topple the Syrian government, they would reward Golan Heights to Tel Aviv. It could not be forgotten that the Israeli PM went to the Israeli border hospitals and visited the wounded armed Syrian opposition forces, however, Syria remains Syria at the end of the road. It would recover and restore its 8,000-years-old civilizational role during which it defeated all of the aggressors.
