Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Monday that his
country will not negotiate with Syria unless it stops sponsoring
terrorist groups, the Ha'aretz daily reported.
Olmert made the remarks shortly after Public Security Minister
Avi Dichter called for ceding the Golan Heights in return for peace
with Syria.
"I recommend not to get carried away with any false hopes,"
Olmert was quoted as saying during a tour of northern Israel.
?"When Syria stops support for terror, when it stops giving
missiles to terror organizations, then we will be happy to
negotiate with them," he said.
"We are not going into any negotiations until basic steps are
taken which can be the basis for any negotiations," he said.
Dichter, a former head of the Shin Bet security service and a
member of the ruling Kadima party, said, "In return for a true
peace with Syria or with Lebanon, I think that what we did with
Egypt and with Jordan is legitimate here as well."
In exchange for return of all of the Sinai peninsula, which was
taken by Israel in the 1967 war, Egypt fully normalized relations
with the Jewish state in their 1979 peace treaty. Jordan also
developed full relations with Israel in a 1994 treaty that included
some return of territory.
The Heights, a plateau on the border of Israel, Lebanon, Jordan
and Syria, was captured by Israel from Syria in the 1967 Middle
East War.
Although Syria regained parts of the Heights during the 1973
Middle East War, large areas of the strategic plateau have remained
under Israeli control.
(Xinhua News Agency August 22, 2006)
