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Syrian rebels arm Palestinians against Assad

Syrian rebels said on Wednesday they had begun arming sympathetic Palestinians to fight a pro-Assad faction in a Palestinian enclave in Damascus – a move which could fuel spiraling intra-Palestinian violence.

Sarkozy’s summit gets every* Arab country to sit with Israel

While the French-initiated summit for the Union for the Mediterranean did not produce any major breakthroughs, French President Nicolas Sarkozy did recognize one achievement: every Arab country but *Libya sitting down with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

Sharon Cool on Assad Peace Offer

Once upon a time, a Syrian president calling for peace talks would have been met by Israeli leaders rolling out the red carpet.

But Bashar Assad\’s recent overtures toward Israel, first made in an interview with The New York Times, have failed to excite Israeli decision-makers.

The chief of Israel\’s military intelligence branch, Maj. Gen. Aharon Farkash Ze\’evi, says Assad is serious and should be put to the test, but Prime Minister Ariel Sharon doubts the Syrian leader\’s sincerity and questions whether giving up the strategic Golan Heights in return for peace with Syria is as much in Israel\’s interest as it once was.

Fearful Assad Places a Risky Bet on Saddam

Judging from his public statements, Assad seems convinced that the Bush administration will not stop at Iraq, and that after a U.S. victory in Baghdad, he could be next on the regime-change agenda.

Therefore, when Assad vilifies the United States and openly aids the Iraqi war effort, he believes he is fighting for his life. In late March, buoyed by what he saw as initial Iraqi success in resisting the U.S.-led invasion, Assad explained the basis of his thinking in a fierce diatribe against Israel and the United States.

The war in Iraq, he told the Lebanese newspaper, As-Safir, was an Israeli-American conspiracy \”designed to redraw the political map of the Middle East.\” In Assad\’s view, the United States would take Iraq\’s oil, and Israel would become the dominant regional power.

U.S. at Center Stage in Syria Talks

They were called \”Syrian-Israeli\” talks, but this week\’s second round of negotiations between the two countries was very much an American affair — in a storybook small town chosen by the White House, with President Clinton playing host and mediator.
So it was no surprise that when the talks were snagged over a disagreements over what to talk about, it was Clinton who held the negotiators\’ hands, cajoled, nudged and pleaded.

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More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.

More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.