I almost negotiated Israel-Syria peace. Here’s how it happened. & More News Here

As 2011 dawned, appreciable progress had been made in defining the salient options of the “line of June 4, 1967”: An unmarked line within the Jordan River Valley adjoining the Golan Heights; the confrontation line between Syrian and Israeli forces earlier than the outbreak of conflict in June 1967. It was to this line that Syria insisted Israel ought to, pursuant to a peace treaty, withdraw. It was this line that will, within the occasion of peace, represent the worldwide boundary between Israel and Syria. Although a meter-by-meter boundary survey would nonetheless be required, by early 2011, the one essential territorial challenge nonetheless in dispute was the situation of the road in relation to the higher a part of the Jordan River flowing into the Sea of Galilee.

Yet progress on territorial points solely elevated the anxiousness of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the readiness of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to ship on Israel’s worth for peace: Syria’s full strategic realignment away from Iran, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Hamas within the Gaza Strip; and the liquidation of all safety threats to Israel arising from Syria and Syrian relationships, together with its relationship with Lebanon. Before shifting any farther right into a diplomatic strategy of potential political peril, Netanyahu needed to make sure that Assad was personally dedicated to Syria’s full geopolitical realignment. He requested that one of many American mediators meet with Assad and ask the robust questions on his readiness to fulfill Israel’s worth for peace, the similar worth set by Washington for lifting American sanctions on Syria.

The following excerpt from my guide, Reaching for the Heights: The Inside Story of a Secret Attempt to Reach a Syrian-Israeli Peace, wherein I cowl how the American aspect ready for the essential one-on-one assembly with Assad. I, the previous director of the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East, was the one that led the mediation and who undertook to fulfill the Syrian president. My guide fills an essential hole within the historical past of American diplomacy selling Israel-Syria peace and accommodates attention-grabbing insights into U.S. overseas coverage and diplomatic finest practices.

An Excerpt

Back in Washington I wrote down, primarily for my very own profit, a abstract of the place I thought issues stood. Despite informative discussions with either side and an ever-evolving dialogue paper, I concluded that the methodology had hit a roadblock.

Both sides, in my opinion, had been, not unsurprisingly, attempting to skew the process to go well with their respective priorities. Israel, whereas providing inventive boundary language and fascinating within the course of, was more and more spooked by Syria’s refusal to have interaction on something however the potential boundary. Netanyahu little doubt felt he was being maneuvered into one thing wanting so much just like the dreaded deposit, and his concern was not with out justification. He needed the back-and-forth with the one-sided dialogue paper dialogues to cease.

Muallem, in the meantime, had supplied a possible breakthrough: Israel’s alternative of matter as soon as boundary language was provisionally agreed upon (or as soon as points nonetheless excellent had been seen by each events as resolvable). We had been shut on territorial points, with the higher Jordan River being the one excellent challenge of any consequence. But Netanyahu’s profound doubts about Assad’s dedication to the general enterprise made even Muallem’s gesture inadequate within the eyes of the prime minister.

It had grow to be clear to me that the continued evolution of the dialogue paper can be problematical and maybe doomed till the events arrived at a mutual understanding of the place the method would finally lead by way of their respective core goals and considerations. Both sides appeared to agree that the specified finish state was peace. Each, nonetheless, strongly doubted the willingness of the opposite to decide to the content material of peace by way of particular deliverables. Although appreciable progress had been made on the mutual deliverables entrance, it appeared inconceivable to flee fully the identical dynamic that had plagued talks within the Nineteen Nineties and at last detonated the Syria-Israel observe in early 2000.

My first thought was to just accept the inevitable and convey a couple of pause in our shuttle diplomacy. My second was to reap the benefits of what Assad had lately reiterated on February 22, constant together with his Wall Street Journal interview on the finish of January, to seven visiting Republican senators, concerning the want for 2 mutually acceptable “defined references,” one on territory and the opposite on safety. It occurred to me that Ross and I ought to subsequently use the pause to compose these two formulations, which we hoped can be the desperately wanted added octane to show the dialogue paper right into a framework settlement (or treaty) rapidly.

Ross agreed, and we mentioned how finest to border the 2 outlined references. Steeped within the historical past of U.S. efforts to advertise Israel-Syria peace, Ross additionally noticed alternative. If the 2 sides could possibly be induced to just accept each outlined references, maybe the time can be proper for proximity and even face-to-face talks the place they might, with American assist, full the drafting of a framework settlement or perhaps a treaty itself. Indeed, Assad had talked about these references as situations for direct negotiations in his dialog with the GOP senators. Ross was considering by way of a secret assembly, maybe in Prague or Budapest.

Naturally, I took the lead in drafting the boundary formulation. The two sides would, in accordance with my formulation, agree that the brand new worldwide boundary between them would mirror the way in which their respective navy forces and civilians had been aligned previous to the outbreak of conflict in June 1967, an alignment referred to by Syria as “the line of June 4, 1967.” Israel and Syria would set up a joint boundary committee to delineate, at a scale appropriate for eventual demarcation, their boundary throughout peace negotiations. To facilitate and expedite the work of the committee, the events would agree up entrance to the next parameters:

• In the northern sector of the demilitarized zone established by the 1949 armistice, the boundary committee would delineate the boundary primarily based on proof out there to it concerning the pre–June 1967 conflict separation of Israeli and Arab civilians and navy forces as facilitated and recorded by U.N. navy observers. The close by Banias Spring can be on the Syrian aspect of the boundary. (The 1923 mandate boundary had positioned it, over robust Zionist objection, inside Syria.)
• In the central sector of the demilitarized zone, the primary geographical reference level guiding the boundary committee can be the Jordan River from the mid-points of the Khoury Farm (Pkak) Bridge and the Banat Yakub (Bnot Yaakov) Bridge to the place the Jordan River enters the Sea of Galilee. Land mendacity to the west of the river on this sector can be inside Israel; land to the east can be in Syria. Israel would train sovereignty over the river on this sector, and Syria might extract from the river and the Banias Spring not more than 50 million cubic meters yearly.
• In the northeastern quadrant of the Sea of Galilee, the boundary would comply with a line on the shore parallel to and ten meters from the sting of the water, following any alteration of the extent of the Sea of Galilee. Arrangements can be arrived at by the events offering for everlasting, unobstructed, visa-free entry for civilians from Israel to the complete circumference of the Sea of Galilee and everlasting, unobstructed, visa-free entry by civilians from Syria to the leisure use of the Sea of Galilee the place it runs alongside the worldwide boundary.
• In the southern sector of the demilitarized zone, the committee would delineate the boundary primarily based on proof out there to it concerning the pre–June 1967 conflict separation of Arab and Israeli civilians and navy forces, together with the division of Arab and Israeli agricultural lands as facilitated and recorded by U.N. navy observers. In this sector, the city of Al-Hamma/Hamat-Gader can be on the Syrian aspect of the boundary.
• The full train of Syrian sovereignty would lengthen to the brand new worldwide boundary inside three years of the treaty of peace coming into pressure.

During months of discussions with the events, I had heard nothing from both aspect that will lead me to imagine that the above formulation can be unacceptable. Yes, there can be ongoing discussions centered on water: Syria was not but reconciled to Israeli sovereignty over the higher Jordan River and Israel will surely wish to decrease Syrian offtakes from the river and its Banias Spring supply.

But if Damascus wouldn’t regard this outlined reference of the boundary as reflecting an correct, affordable, and defensible depiction of the road of June 4, 1967, then clearly it was not engaged severely. And if Israel proved unable to just accept a formulation in step with undertakings it had declared provisionally doable, then clearly it was not ready to pay the value for peace.

The fast problem, nonetheless, was to get the assembly with Bashar al-Assad. The alternative in entrance of our faces was for him to just accept an outlined reference on safety — one drafted by Ross and me —that will persuade Netanyahu that Assad was actually dedicated to peace and to Syria’s basic strategic reorientation within the area. Drafting that doc turned, subsequently, a urgent precedence.

But first issues first: how to rearrange the assembly?

I recommended to Special Envoy Mitchell that the very best plan of action is perhaps for Secretary Clinton to name her Syrian counterpart, Walid al-Muallem, and ask that he request a one-on-one assembly for me with President Assad. Mitchell readily agreed, as did Clinton.

Clinton determined, nonetheless, to preface the decision to Muallem by talking first with Netanyahu. Yitzhak Molcho, in a dialog with Clinton and Deputy Secretary of State William (Bill) Burns, had mirrored Israel’s acceptance in precept of full withdrawal as the value of peace with Syria. Still, he indicated Israel’s profound uncertainty about Assad, expressing the concern that Israel can be lodging the equal of the deposit solely to seek out Assad lower than dedicated to an finish sport requiring him to do something of substance.

Molcho emphasised that his boss — Netanyahu — was severe about exploring peace with Syria, that he was prepared and keen to do the deal, and that he noticed the U.S. position as essential. Clinton replied that it was essential for the United States to have a transparent sense of not solely Assad’s seriousness but in addition Netanyahu’s; in any other case, the United States can be out on a limb politically if Assad’s dedication to strategic reorientation had been nailed down solely to seek out Israel backing away. Molcho informed the secretary that his boss would name her over the weekend to substantiate his seriousness; this might give her the reassurance she sought.

Bill Burns directed me to arrange “talking points” for that decision. Whether Clinton adopted my factors precisely I have no idea. Had she carried out so she would have informed Netanyahu the next:

• We have a really promising growth on the Syria observe. During his final spherical in Damascus, Fred Hof managed to show Syria’s stubbornness on the boundary challenge to our benefit by getting Walid Muallem to acknowledge that after the boundary part of Fred’s paper is completed, the following topic to be mentioned can be your alternative fully.
• This is precisely what we’ve been in search of. This provides us a possibility to roll in on Assad personally and have the type of discuss with him you need us to have. This provides us the chance to seek out out for positive that he is aware of the value by way of strategic reorientation.
• Based on Fred’s interactions together with your aspect and theirs, the boundary variations are negligible by way of distances.
• In the northern and southern ends, there are not any variations price debating.
• In the Kinneret [Sea of Galilee] space, I assume the ten-meter line from the 1923 and 1949 agreements will work.
• Along the Jordan River feeding into Kinneret, they need the road to run by way of the midpoints of the 2 bridges down the center of the river. Your aspect would like one thing like ten meters off the japanese financial institution.
• We don’t wish to get slowed down in boundary trivialities or trivia. What I recommend is that you simply enable us to inform them that, within the occasion a full settlement is reached, Israel agrees that the boundary language will mirror a mutually agreed formulation falling inside the parameters of their proposal and your response.
• Armed with this, we are able to have the dialog that can inform us whether or not we have now in Assad an precise associate.
• If we determine we don’t have a associate, we’ll shut this initiative down and take the place that it by no means occurred.
• If we determine we do have a associate, we’ll focus our consideration on the Syrian relationships points till they’re nailed down.
• In the meantime, we might convene a confidential assembly in a mutually agreeable place to debate and finalize boundary and water issues.
• We may even make sure that Assad understands and accepts the necessity for what you describe as “theater.” We agree that is important.
• In sum, we have now a transparent approach ahead to the center of the matter. We’ll shield you on this utterly. The president is totally conscious and dedicated. We want you to assist us make this breakthrough.

Whether or not she recited the speaking factors verbatim, Secretary Clinton got here away from the decision totally glad that Netanyahu — although nonetheless deeply skeptical of Assad’s involvement and intentions — was certainly dedicated to the method and to full withdrawal if his wants had been met.

Clinton was fairly ready, subsequently, to talk with Muallem to request the assembly. She assured him on two factors: her view that Netanyahu was severely engaged and will, if obligatory, be pulled by the United States throughout the end line on territorial points; and that my potential assembly with Assad was not an try to avoid Muallem. U.S. mediation had reached a crucial go–no go stage, and we needed to evaluate, primarily based on the Syrian president’s personal views and phrases, whether or not it was price persevering with the trouble to dealer Syria-Israel peace or to focus all our consideration as a substitute on Israel-Palestine.

Muallem assured Clinton that Assad was totally on board with the method; he had, in spite of everything, agreed to it within the presence of each George Mitchell and me in mid-September 2010. And there was the crucial dialog with John Kerry in May 2010. But he (Muallem) would ahead and assist the request and attempt to prepare a phone dialog between Clinton and Assad himself.

That Clinton-Assad name came about on February 23, 2011, at 9:01 within the morning in Washington and lasted fifteen minutes.

Clinton succeeded early within the dialog in acquiring Assad’s consent to a personal assembly with me within the very close to future. She assured the Syrian president of the seriousness of the opposite get together and the readiness of the United States to make sure that the wants of either side can be met.

Assad’s assembly on February 22 with Senator Richard Shelby and Shelby’s colleagues contributed considerably to the dialog. During that assembly, Assad had pressured (as he had just a few weeks earlier within the Wall Street Journal) that it can be inconceivable to come back to a peace settlement till fundamental references had been outlined and agreed to by either side. The reference of biggest significance to Syria (territory) was already the topic of many hours of labor by U.S. consultants. The reference of biggest significance to Israel (safety) required way more perception into the small print of what Syria can be keen to do. Although Assad as chief of state was free to construction the forthcoming assembly as he wished, the main target of my mission can be to sound out the president on the particular contents of the safety reference.

Clinton additionally succeeded in establishing a transparent linkage between Syria-Israel peace and a considerably improved bilateral relationship between Damascus and Washington. Lifting sanctions, giving financial help, and inspiring commerce: every part was on the desk if the phrases of peace could possibly be arrived at.

Assad indicated he was prepared to fulfill and that readability was his goal. He reiterated the seriousness of his aspect and his robust want for achievement. He expressed hope that President Obama would sometime go to Syria.

As she had carried out telephonically with Netanyahu and Muallem, Clinton was delivering the mail rapidly and effectively. My doubts about President Obama’s dedication to Israel-Syria peace had been in the interim resolved; Clinton’s assurances to Assad left me with the impression that Dennis Ross was prevailing over the Syria-Israel observe doubters within the president’s inside circle.

Completing the outlined reference on safety took on apparent urgency. Ross had taken the drafting lead on the outset, and with little time to spare, it was completed rapidly. In the top, it was a one-page dialogue paper with a preamble, 5 factors, and three footnotes. The preamble and 5 factors said:

This settlement [the prospective framework agreement/peace treaty] will finish the state of conflict between Syria and Israel, set up peace, and require actions by each Parties to create a bilateral relationship and relationships with all different actors in step with this new actuality. Accordingly, neither aspect, in full accordance with the relevant rules of worldwide legislation and the United Nations Charter, will threaten or render direct or oblique assist to any acts, efforts, or plans of some other state or non-state actor, which threaten the safety or security of the opposite Party or its residents. In explicit, with the entry into pressure of the settlement,

1. The Parties will chorus from the risk or use of pressure, straight or not directly, in opposition to one another and can settle all disputes between them by peaceable means.
2. The Parties will terminate and prohibit any actions on their territories or by their nationals that present help to any common, irregular or paramilitary forces in search of to hurt the opposite Party or its residents. [Footnote 1]
3. Neither Party will invoke its proper beneath any treaty, settlement or enterprise with some other state or non-state actor offering for the collective use of pressure in opposition to the opposite Party, or reply favorably to a request for help within the risk or use of pressure in opposition to the opposite Party beneath such a treaty, settlement or enterprise, or enter into or preserve a hostile alliance in opposition to the opposite Party. [Footnote 2]
4. Neither Party will switch weaponry or navy tools to Lebanon or allow such transfers from or by way of its territory, besides to official safety forces of the Government of Lebanon. [Footnote 3]
5. The Parties share the aim of complete Arab-Israeli peace and acknowledge this may require peace agreements between Palestinians and Israelis, Lebanon and Israel, and the normalization of relations between all members of the League of Arab States and Israel. Both Parties will make their utmost efforts to attain this goal.

The preamble and 5 factors had been written in such a approach that a lot of the language could possibly be inserted straight right into a Syria-Israel framework settlement or treaty. If Assad had been to show unable to enroll to this formulation, it would clearly be the top of my efforts.

The footnotes, nonetheless, received right down to particular circumstances. And we anticipated that the wording of the three footnotes would give Assad actual pause, for the footnotes spelled out the troublesome and even harmful actions he must undertake. Here is what the president of Syria must think about:

1. In apply, given the present insurance policies of those teams, Syria would want to terminate its provision of navy and monetary help (together with arms, dual-use objects, coaching and intelligence) to Hezbollah (whether or not in Syria or Lebanon), Hamas and different Palestinian teams planning, advocating and fascinating in violence in opposition to Israel and Israelis, and expel from Syria to international locations apart from Lebanon all personnel affiliated with these and some other teams utilizing Syrian territory for the prohibited actions.
2. Syria reportedly has collective safety agreements with Iran, Hezbollah, and Arab League events that will fall inside this requirement. As one instance, Syria would want to finish its relationship with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (together with the Quds Force) and prohibit the passage of its personnel and their tools by way of Syrian territory and airspace. Syria would additionally must terminate any agreements (if there are any) which particularly present for the risk or use of pressure in opposition to Israel and Israeli residents.
3. Accordingly, Syria would want to finish its participation in and facilitation of all transfers of arms and navy tools (together with dual-use objects) to Hezbollah both in Lebanon or for switch into Lebanon. Syria would equally must deny the move of weapons to Palestinian teams in Lebanon and assist efforts to disarm them.

Any dialogue of those three footnotes would current Assad with a number of choices, all of them consequential.

He would possibly resort to his authorities’s customary private and non-private apply of denial, claiming, for instance, that any arms shifting from Syria to Hezbollah in Lebanon represented the work of “smugglers.”

He would possibly mix denial with legalistic haggling over the wording of every footnote, attempting to change the dimensions and shapes of Syria’s potential deliverables.

He would possibly, reflecting on the importance of what he was being requested to think about, ask for a “time-out” within the mediation course of in order that he and his nationwide safety advisers might undertake a cautious evaluation of the necessities the deal would impose on Syria and the challenges of implementing them.

He would possibly flatly pronounce the necessities undoable. Or he would possibly label them implementable solely after Israeli troopers and civilians had been gone from occupied Syrian territory.

He would possibly situation his acceptance on greater than full territorial restoration, thereby alienating Israel and undermining the power of the United States to persist in its mediation.

He would possibly, ideally, comply with it all if the treaty’s phrases supplied for Syria’s eventual restoration of all land to the road of June 4, 1967. This I thought of to be the least probably situation. Notwithstanding the Kerry doc of June 2010, I didn’t count on an uncomplicated settlement in full.

Ambassador Frederic C. Hof is Bard College’s Diplomat in Residence.

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