Mustafa Domanic is an online activist and blogger. He contributes to several blogs on Turkish current affairs as well as global political issues including foreignsight.blogspot.com.
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Mustafa Domanic
Istanbul, Turkey
Mustafa Domanic is an online activist and blogger. He contributes to several blogs on Turkish current affairs as well as global political issues including foreignsight.blogspot.com.
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1. Why should a long term peace deal between Israel and Syria be contingent on the former "resolving her primary issues with Hamas and the Palestinians?" Granted, the problems are somewhat related but they are hardly intertwined.
Essentially, what Syria wants is return of the Golan and renewed access to water that she lost in the '67 war. What Israel wants is long term peace with Syria and assurances that the Golan Heights will not be re-militarized by Syria nor Israel's own access to water unfairly impeded. This would seem to be an attainable outcome and one that would benefit both nations. However, geopolitical realities are in order. Syria is no more likely to sever relations with Hezbollah and Hamas than Israel is to sever its own with the United States. Fortunately, that would not appear to be a critical necessity, as Domanic seems to agree in his second paragraph.
2. With respect to resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, that only becomes possible if Israel returns to her pre-1967 borders AND the integrity of those borders are Great-Power- insured by, at a minimum, the United States. Absent this, any negotiations will be as best described by a line in a Shakespearean play: "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying ... nothing."
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All Comments (1)
Adressing Domanic's comments in sequence:
1. Why should a long term peace deal between Israel and Syria be contingent on the former "resolving her primary issues with Hamas and the Palestinians?" Granted, the problems are somewhat related but they are hardly intertwined.
Essentially, what Syria wants is return of the Golan and renewed access to water that she lost in the '67 war. What Israel wants is long term peace with Syria and assurances that the Golan Heights will not be re-militarized by Syria nor Israel's own access to water unfairly impeded. This would seem to be an attainable outcome and one that would benefit both nations. However, geopolitical realities are in order. Syria is no more likely to sever relations with Hezbollah and Hamas than Israel is to sever its own with the United States. Fortunately, that would not appear to be a critical necessity, as Domanic seems to agree in his second paragraph.
2. With respect to resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, that only becomes possible if Israel returns to her pre-1967 borders AND the integrity of those borders are Great-Power- insured by, at a minimum, the United States. Absent this, any negotiations will be as best described by a line in a Shakespearean play: "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying ... nothing."
November 10, 2008 6:29 PM | Report Offensive Comments
Posted on November 10, 2008 18:29