Latest news with #SyriaIsraelRelations
Khaleej Times
2 days ago
- Business
- Khaleej Times
US envoy suggests 'non-aggression agreement' between Syria and Israel
The United States' new envoy for Syria, Thomas Barrack, called for a non-aggression agreement between Syria and Israel in remarks to Saudi channel Al Arabiya on Thursday. Syria and Israel have technically been at war since 1948, with Israel taking the Golan Heights from Syria in 1967. Since the ouster in December of former president Bashar Al Assad, Israel has carried out hundreds of air strikes and multiple incursions into Syria. Barrack, who inaugurated the US ambassador's residence in Damascus on Thursday, said the conflict between the two countries was a "solvable problem". To him, Syria and Israel could "start with just a non-aggression agreement, talk about boundaries and borders" to build a new relationship with its neighbour. Israel has said its strikes on Syria were aimed at preventing advanced weapons from falling into the hands of the new authorities, whom it considers jihadists. It has also threatened further intervention should the new authorities fail to protect the Druze religious minority. Syria's interim President Ahmed Al Sharaa said earlier this month that his administration was holding "indirect talks" with Israel to calm tensions between the two countries. Restoring US ties Sharaa, who led the rebel offensive that toppled Assad in December, was once a jihadist leader wanted in the United States. Since coming to power, he has repeatedly pledged inclusive governance that is open to the world, and restored Syria's ties with global powers, ending decades of isolation under Assad. While on tour in the Gulf earlier this month, US President Donald Trump announced the lifting of sanctions on Syria, and said he hoped the country would normalise relations with Israel. "I told him, I hope you're going to join once you're straightened out and he said yes. But they have a lot of work to do," he said of Sharaa. He also called Sharaa a "young, attractive guy" with a "very strong past. Fighter". On May 8, Sharaa said in France that Syria was holding "indirect talks through mediators" with Israel to "try to contain the situation so it does not reach the point where it escapes the control of both sides". The United States has in recent months started rebuilding ties with Syria, ending more than a decade of diplomatic freeze. Syria signed a $7 billion energy deal on Thursday with a consortium of Qatari, US and Turkish companies as it seeks to rehabilitate its war-ravaged electricity sector. US flag raised The agreement, signed in the presence of interim Sharaa and Barrack, is expected to generate 5,000 megawatts of electricity and cover half of the country's needs. Barrack, who is also ambassador to Turkey, inaugurated the US ambassador's residence in the Syrian capital with Syrian Foreign Minister Assaad Al Shaibani, state media outlet Sana reported. AFP photographers saw the US flag raised at the ambassador's residence, just a few hundred metres from the US embassy in the Abu Rummaneh neighbourhood, under tight security. "Tom understands there is great potential in working with Syria to stop radicalism, improve relations, and secure peace in the Middle East," Trump said, according to a post on the State Department's X. The US embassy in Syria was closed after Assad's repression of a peaceful uprising that began in 2011, which degenerated into civil war. Barrack met with interim President Ahmed Al Sharaa in Istanbul on May 24, after the United States lifted sanctions on Syria. The meeting followed a meeting in Riyadh between Trump and Sharaa, who led the Islamist coalition that toppled Assad in December. The last US ambassador to Syria, Robert Ford, was declared persona non grata in 2011 after defying the Syrian government by visiting a city that was under army siege and the site of a major anti-regime protests. In late December, a US delegation led by Barbara Leaf, the State Department's Middle East representative, held an initial meeting with the new leadership in Damascus.
Reuters
20-05-2025
- Politics
- Reuters
Exclusive: Syrian leadership approved return of dead spy archive to Israel, sources say
AMMAN/DAMASCUS, May 20 (Reuters) - Syria's leadership approved the handover of the belongings of long-dead spy Eli Cohen to Israel in a bid to ease Israeli hostility and show goodwill to U.S. President Donald Trump, three sources told Reuters. Israel announced its recovery of the trove of documents, photographs and personal possessions relating to Cohen on Sunday, saying its spy agency Mossad had worked with an unnamed foreign intelligence agency to secure the material. However, a Syrian security source, an adviser to Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa and a person familiar with backchannel talks between the countries said the archive of material was in fact offered to Israel as an indirect gesture by Sharaa as he seeks to cool tensions and build Trump's confidence. Cohen, who was hanged in 1965 in a downtown Damascus square after infiltrating Syria's political elite, is still regarded as a hero in Israel and Mossad's most celebrated spy for uncovering military secrets that aided its lightning victory in the 1967 Middle East war. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described Cohen on Sunday as a legend and "the greatest intelligence agent in the annals of the state". While Israel has long sought to recover his body for reburial at home, the return of his archive held for 60 years by Syrian intelligence was hailed by Mossad as "an achievement of the highest moral order". Israel has not publicly revealed how the archive came into its possession, saying only that it was the result of "a covert and complex Mossad operation, in cooperation with an allied foreign intelligence service". Netanyahu's office, Syrian officials and the White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Syria's role in Israel's recovery of the Cohen archive. After rebels led by Sharaa suddenly ousted President Bashar al-Assad in December, ending his family's 54-year-long rule, they found the Cohen dossier in a state security building, according to the Syrian security source. Sharaa and his foreign advisers quickly decided to use the material as leverage, the source added. The Syrian security source said Sharaa had realised that the Cohen archive was important to the Israelis and that its return could amount to a significant diplomatic gesture. Ending Israeli attacks on Syria and improving relations with the United States and other Western countries are vital for Sharaa as he seeks to revive his shattered country after 14 years of civil war. Israel regards Sharaa and his ex-insurgents, who once formed the al Qaeda faction in Syria, as unreconstructed jihadists. Israeli forces staged an incursion into border areas last year and have repeatedly bombed targets in support of Syria's minority Druze sect. This month, Reuters reported that the United Arab Emirates had set up a backchannel for talks between Israel and Syria that included efforts to build confidence between the sides. There have also been other indirect channels for talks, according to two people familiar with the matter. In the talks, Syria agreed to measures including returning the remains of Cohen as well as three Israeli soldiers killed while fighting Syrian forces in Lebanon in the early 1980s, a person familiar with those talks said. The body of one of those soldiers, Zvi Feldman, has been returned, Israel said last week. The return of the Cohen archive came in the context of those confidence-building measures and was done with Sharaa's direct approval, the person said. Last week, Trump held a surprise meeting with Sharaa in Saudi Arabia where he urged him to normalise ties with Israel and announced that he would lift sanctions on Syria. Syrian officials have said they want peace with all states in the region, and Sharaa confirmed this month that Damascus had carried out indirect talks with Israel via states it has ties with in order to calm the situation.
Al Bawaba
14-05-2025
- Politics
- Al Bawaba
Trump urges Ahmed al-Sharaa to normalize ties with Israel
NEWS Published May 14th, 2025 - 07:58 GMT A handout picture provided by the Saudi Royal Palace shows Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (R) watching as US President Donald Trump (C) shakes hands with Syria's interim president Ahmed al-Sharaa in Riyadh on May 14, 2025. PHOTO / SAUDI ROYAL PALACE / BANDAR AL-JALOUD ALBAWABA - US President Donald Trump called on Syria to normalize relations with Israel and join the Abraham Accords, AFP reported on Wednesday. © 2000 - 2025 Al Bawaba (
