Israel said Monday it is “interested” in striking peace agreements with neighbouring Lebanon and Syria, a potentially historic shift in the region after decades of war and animosity.<\/p>\n
With Syria under new leadership after the fall of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad and Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah movement weakened, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar told journalists his government wanted more normalisation agreements with Arab countries.<\/p>\n
“Israel is interested in expanding the Abraham Accords circle of peace and normalisation,” Saar said of the US-brokered deals that Israel signed with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco in 2020, during US President Donald Trump’s first term.<\/p>\n
“We have an interest in adding countries such as Syria and Lebanon, our neighbours — to the circle of peace and normalisation while safeguarding Israel’s essential and security interests,” Saar told a news conference in Jerusalem alongside his Austrian counterpart Beate Meinl-Reisinger.<\/p>\n
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Thursday that Israel’s recent “victory” in a 12-day war against Iran “opens the path to dramatically enlarge the peace accords”.<\/p>\n
– Golan Heights tensions –<\/p>\n
Control of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights has long been a source of tension between Israel and Syria, which are technically still at war.<\/p>\n
Saar insisted that the strategic plateau, which Israel seized from Syria in 1967 and later annexed in a move not recognised by the United Nations, “will remain part of the State of Israel” under any future peace agreement.<\/p>\n
Following Assad’s overthrow in December, Israel moved forces into the UN-patrolled demilitarised zone in the Golan, and has carried out hundreds of strikes against military targets in Syria.<\/p>\n
In Lebanon, the clout of militant group Hezbollah has diminished after it had emerged bruised from a conflict with Israel last year, fuelled by Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.<\/p>\n
Israel, however, has kept up strikes against Hezbollah despite a November ceasefire.<\/p>\n
There was no immediate response from Lebanese or Syrian officials to Saar’s remarks.<\/p>\n
– US peace call –<\/p>\n
US officials say the end of the 12-day war between Israel and Iran with a ceasefire on June 24 has raised prospects for broader peace efforts in the region.<\/p>\n
On Sunday, a senior US diplomat called for peace agreements by Israel with Syria and Lebanon in the wake of the Iran-Israel ceasefire and expected there would be discussions about it.<\/p>\n
Tom Barrack, the US ambassador to Turkey who is also a special envoy to Syria, said Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa “has indicated that he doesn’t hate Israel and that he wants peace on that border,” Barrack told Turkish news agency Anadolu.<\/p>\n
“I think that will also happen with Lebanon. It’s a necessity to have an agreement with Israel,” he added.<\/p>\n
Pressure has risen on the Israeli government to end its offensive in the Gaza Strip, prompted by Hamas’s deadly attack in October 2023.<\/p>\n
“Everybody is starting to move back towards the Abraham Accords, especially as the Gaza situation dissipates,” Barrack said.<\/p>\n
“What just happened between Israel and Iran is an opportunity for all of us to say: ‘Time out. Let’s create a new road’,” he added.<\/p>\n
“The Middle East is ready to have a new dialogue, people are tired of the same old story.”<\/p>\n
sdu\/rlp\/acc\/ysm<\/p>\n
\u00a9 Agence France-Presse<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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