Israel should seize the opportunity to revive peace talks with Syria while there is a real chance of success, or risk further destabilizing the Middle East, concluded a new report by the International Crisis Group, an independent, non-profit, non-governmental organization aimed at preventing and resolving deadly conflicts.

The report, titled “Restarting Israeli-Syrian Negotiations”, examined prospects for renewing peace negotiations between Syria and Israel against the backdrop of regional developments, including last summer’s conflict between Israel and the Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah and the re-launch of the Arab peace initiative at the Arab League summit last March.

Although the Israeli-Syrian conflict is not the region’s costliest, it has maintained tensions in the Middle East and could lead to another armed conflict between the two countries, the report states.

Peace talks between Israel and Syria collapsed in 2000, mainly over Israeli refusal to return the Golan Heights, a strategic plateau in southwestern Syria that Israel seized in the 1967 Middle East War and unilaterally annexed in 1981.

More than 15,000 Israeli settlers are now living in the Golan along with 16,000 Syrians who remained in a small number of villages there.

The Israeli government refuses to comply with UN Resolutions 242 and 338 that call for the complete withdrawal from occupied Arab territories, as well as Resolution 479 which confirms the illegality of Israel's annexation of the Golan.

The Crisis Group’s report examines Israel’s possible reasons for holding on to the Golan – such as the strength of the settler population and the territory’s role as a security-buffer. “But the benefits of peace far outweigh those of continued occupation”, says Nicolas Pelham, Crisis Group’s Senior Analyst in Israel.

“Recent regional developments have made an Israeli-Syrian agreement more urgent, more important and more attainable,” Pelham added.

Syria has repeatedly signaled its readiness to resume talks with Israel without any preconditions. But the obstacles to a peace deal appear daunting, including a U.S. administration intent on isolating Syria and a weak Israeli government that has conditioned any dialogue on a broad change in Damascus’ policy: severing ties to Palestinian resistance group Hamas and Lebanon’s Hezbollah resistance movement and altering its relationship with Iran.

According to the Crisis Group, Syria’s regional posture and relationships with Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran would inevitably change following a peace deal. In other words, what Israel demands could potentially be achieved, but only as part of a final deal, not as preconditions for it.

While official resistance to negotiations is clear in Israel, Syria’s appetite for peace talks is diminishing – a result of repeated Israeli rebuffs.

“Rejecting Syria’s overtures is a mistake which is fast on its way to becoming a missed opportunity”, warns Peter Harling, Crisis Group’s Senior Analyst in Damascus. “The mood in Damascus is turning decidedly skeptical, and the regime is reverting to its more cautious habits. Mirroring Israeli doubts on Syria’s seriousness, officials here are deeply disillusioned with Israel, questioning its ability and readiness to negotiate in earnest”.

The Crisis Group’s report was released days before Syria distanced itself from comments made by a Syrian-American businessman who recently told Israeli MPs that he had been at the heart of unofficial peace talks with Israel. “The statements and the ideas of the American-Syrian Ibrahim Suleiman do not reflect the point of view of Syria, which has repeated many times its refusal to undertake secret negotiations" with Israel, a Syrian foreign ministry official was quoted as saying.

Recently, Suleiman told a top Israeli parliamentary panel that he and former Israeli foreign ministry director general Alon Liel headed two years of secret talks between the two countries during which understandings were reached for a peace agreement that he said could be struck within six months. "Our work is done, now it's up to officials in Israel and Syria to sit down and iron out their differences," Suleiman said. "We gave them a peace map.”

“Syria's President Bashar al-Assad wants peace with Israel. He wants to make peace and be known as the man of peace," he stressed.

Despite Syria’s rejection of Suleiman’s comments, one fact remains clear: Syria is willing to resume official talks with Israel, which should seize the opportunity before it’s too late.

Moreover, resuming talks with Syria would help ongoing efforts to revive the Arab peace initiative, which calls for normalization of ties with Israel in exchange for its withdrawal from Arab land seized in the 1967 war.

The Crisis Group also called on Quartet members to press for renewed Syrian-Israeli negotiations. While both the U.S. and Israel may prefer to give precedence to the Palestinian over the Syrian conflict, lack of movement on the latter inevitably will hamper the former, the Crisis group said.

A number of recommendations to remove obstacles to the resumption of Israeli-Syrian peace talks were presented in the Crisis Group report and restated in the unofficial peace initiative involving Suleiman and Alon Liel. Under such conditions, there is little justification for Israel to put off peace talks – and even less justification for the U.S. to oppose them.

“Israel-Syria peace negotiations would profoundly alter regional atmospherics. A peace deal would fundamentally transform them”, says Robert Malley, Crisis Group’s Middle East Program Director. “This opportunity may not last forever. It should not be wasted”. (Source: Aljazeera.com)