Rumblings On The Heights

Photos By Getty Images

by Steve Lipman

It was quiet on the Golan Heights last week. If you count the rumble of troops, tanks and firearms on the hills of northern Israel — and the warnings of war across the border — as quiet.

Soldiers in the Israeli Army took part in training exercises on the Heights for the last several weeks, even as Syrian President Bashar Assad, who recently expressed renewed interest in peace talks with Israel, last week alluded to the resumption of hostilities.

If the “occupied Syrian Golan” does not return to Syria through peaceful means, Assad declared at an Islamic economic forum in Istanbul, “The failure of negotiations towards the full restoration of rights automatically means resistance is the alternative solution.

“Resisting the occupation is

a national duty,” he said. “It is our legitimate and moral obligation to support it, and it is an honor that we take pride in.”

In the Golan, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak also gave a mixed message. At a ceremony in Katzrin, where soldiers who fought there in 1967 were honored, Barak said Israel would continue to leave “no stone unturned” in its quest for peace. But, he added, “You must be strong and sure of yourself, with two feet on the ground, eyes wide open, with the left hand seeking peace in all ways, and the right hand on the trigger.”

The Golan Heights exercises, which will end next month, were part of several conducted by the army in recent weeks — Israeli soldiers also took part in military drills elsewhere with U.S. troops, and in the Beit She’an Valley with their Jordanian counterparts.

And one sign of peace in the Golan this week: Israel allowed three Syrian-born women, who live in Druze villages in the Heights and are married to Druze men there, to cross back into Syria to visit ill relatives.

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